The battle between Hip Hop heavyweights, 50 “Curtis” Cent and Kanye “Bush Hates Blacks” West, kicks off today… 50 has said he would retire from his solo career if Kanye’s “Graduation” out sells “Curtis”, and Kanye thinks he’s moving big numbers already. It’s such a big event that 50 and Kanye will appear on BET together to promote the albums, aided by Stuart Scott. According to the early rumor mill:

Initial prognostications from the respective camps in the Kanye West-50 Cent-Kenny Chesney chart race see the two rappers in the 600k range, each with a shot at beating Linkin Park’s first-week record of 625k back in May, while Chesney looks to be in the 450-500k area. As far as pre-orders go, West is leading 50 by 2-1 at both iTunes and Amazon.com, though Fitty has a 2-1 edge in searches at Yahoo, a reliable measure of buzz factor. Read the full story