Finally, a decision is at hand regarding a question of mammoth civic import. The parties involved have laid it on the line, giving it their all, and within the next week the long-anticipated choice will be finalized. The competition has been spirited, capturing the public's imagination while dominating the media. And soon a decision will be made that shall reverberate in households throughout Northeast Ohio.

"It was lonely," Danny Ferry says in describing his first few days on the job as Cleveland Cavaliers general manager. "It was just  Mike Brown and I in a room and we had no infrastructure, no staff and a big job in front of us. It was 'all right, let's go — but what do we do?'"

There have been two great heavyweight champions whose first name began with the letter E. One of them, Ezzard Charles, ended his career with multiple defeats, financial problems and health failures. Will the other, Evander Holyfield, follow on this same troubled path?

    Though his talent has been recognized more in recent years, Ezzard Charles still receives much less attention than most fighters, present and past, of comparable ability. But he had a fabulous career, beating Marty Simmons, Teddy Yarosz, Anton Christofordis, Charley Burley (twice), Steve Mamakos, Booker Beckwith, Jose Basora, Mose Brown, Joey Maxim (five times) Jimmy Bivins (four times) Lloyd Marshall (twice) Archie Moore (three times) Billy Smith (twice), Eru Sarlin (twice) Fitzie Fitzpatrick (twice), Elmer Ray, Sam Baroudi, Walter Hafer, Joe Baksi, Jersey Joe Walcott (twice), Gus Lesnovich,, Pat Valentino, Freddy Beshore, an old but still tough Joe Louis, Nick Barone, Lee Oma, Rex Layne (twice) Joe Kahut, Bernie Reynolds, Caesar Brion, Tommy Harrison, Bill Gilliam, Coley Wallace, Bob Satterfield, Charley Norkus, John Holman, Paul Andrews and Toxie Hall. He also fought a draw with Ken Overlin. He was a great fighter at middleweight and heavyweight and may well have been the greatest light heavyweight of all time. He was lighning fast, dead game, a master boxer and a fine hitter.

    All but four of these victories came before his probably pivotal two bouts, in terms of his physical well being, against Rocky Marciano. Other tough bouts prior to meeting Marciano were losses to Overlin, Kid Tunero, Ray, Walcott (twice, one skin-tight, the other a brutal kayo), Nino Valdes and close ones to Layne and Harold Johnson. As he said before the Marciano fight, Ezzard had a big experience edge on Rocky.But, although they were only two years apart in age, Ezzard had also gone through a lot more wear and tear.

    Some say Ezzard was already slipping before his first encounter with Rocky or that he already had a touch of the disease – lateral sclerosis of the spine ‑ that killed him. I doubt it, though one never knows. Ezz came close to winning and might well have won if he’d kept boxing Rocky and hadn’t switched to slugging – perhaps to please the audience. And some, a definite but decent-sized minority, thought that he did win.

    But the brutality of the first Marciano fight, on top of all his other tough battles, did put Ezzard over the hill. He came close to winning their second fight, too, but only because he managed to split the Rock’s nose in half. Other than that, it was Marciano nearly all the way. Charles was down several times and took head punch after head punch from one of the hardest hitters of all time before sinking to the floor in defeat.

    After that it was mostly all decline. In 1955, Charles was still a contender, but a rapidly declining one. He was 6-5 for the year, beating Charley Norkus, John Holman and Paul Andrews, but losing to Holman, Hurricane Jackson (twice) and young Jack Johnson, while splitting two fights with Toxie Hall. But in 1957, he melted out of contention, going 2-4 with no significant wins and losing to Wayne Bethea, Pat McMurtry, Harry Mathews and Dick Richardson.

    Ezz retired but was unable to find a job that suited him. He had made a number of bad investments, was a sucker for parasites and lost most of what he had. So n 1958, Ezzard came back again. He beat two non-entities, lost to Alfred Zusny and Alvin Green and was knocked out by Donny Fleeman and George Logan. One newspaper referred to Charles as a “hollow shell” after his loss to Fleeman. He retired at the end of the year, with his last few fighting years possibly creating and certainly aggravating his health problems. By the end of the ‘60s he was in a wheel chair. He died in 1975. The only heavyweight champs who died younger were Max Baer, Marciano (in a plane crash) and Sonny Liston (of a drug overdose).

    While Charles kept fighting for the money, Evander Holyfield is still searching for glory. Yet the physical effects of Evander’s prolonged career may be similar to Ezzard’s. The iron-jawed, heavily muscled Holyfield is more durable than Charles. But while Ezzard was slick defensively, Evander is one of the poorest defensive fighters ever to hold the heavyweight crown. He has been described as having no defense and leading with his head. And this was when he was fast. He fought well defensively in his career masterpiece when he deflated Mike Tyson, but that was about it. Still, Evander had tons of strength and speed, a concrete chin, offensive skill, guts galore, and an inconsistent but always at least good and sometimes great punch. He beat Dwight Muhammad Quawi (twice), Mike Tyson (twice), Riddick Bowe, Pinklon Thomas, Michael Dokes, Ricky Parkyy, Henry Tillman Carlos De Leon, Bobby Cyz, John Ruiz, Hasim Rachman, Alex Stewart (twice), James Tillis, Bert Cooper, Ray Mercer, Michael Moorer, Lou Savarese, Buster Douglas,  Frey Oquendo, an old but still tough Larry Holmes and George Foreman, among others, and drew with Lennox Lewis.

    Time after time, age and medical problems appeared to be about to finish Evander off and he has come back with exciting wins, but it’s been mostly downhill lately. He was stopped by the grossly overweight James Toney, received a boxing lesson from never was Larry Donald and was recently whipped by Sultan Ibramakov, who was lucky to get a draw with the super-inept Ray “the Rainman” Austin. In a rather pitiful scenario afterward, the Sultan’s manager noted something to the effect that Holyfield had had it if “he couldn’t beat my guy.”  Ibramakov responded indignantly that he had beaten Shannon Briggs and Holyfield and even claimed that he deserved the win against Austin (whether that was true or not, the Sultan would be better off never reminding anyone of that fight). After this last bout, Holyfield incredibly stated that he would continue to fight and ultimately regain the heavyweight crown.

    Evander is 45, eight years older than Charles was at the end of his career. His speed, durability, strength, punch and stamina are not what they were. As with Charles, he is taking beatings from men who once weren’t worthy to carry his gym bag. He has accomplished great things, has nothing more to prove and appears in good financial shape. Let’s hope he retires before his health winds up like that of the other great champion with the same first initial.

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With the American media capturing whatever Lindsay Lohan did last night and where items one week old are treated as ancient history, Elvis Presley – who died 33 years ago — remains nearly as popular as ever. Why?