He stutters and he's black, that about all that is said about that. I never said more.
Timo Sheard
Head XC Coach
Cedar Park High School
He stutters and he's black, that about all that is said about that. I never said more.
Timo Sheard
Head XC Coach
Cedar Park High School
runn wrote:
I basically grew up with his career. I loved him, revered him. Now, remember that we didn't hear about star athlete's flaws back then. I also looked up to Mickey Mantle- imagine him today? Rehab, bad press, etc ...
Ali was a champion, he or Marciano were the best (I thought Marciano).
I don't know- he was a great champion who made his sport exciting and popular.
There they go, every time I start talkin' 'bout boxing, a white man got to pull Rocky Marciano out they ass. That's their one, that's their one. Rocky Marciano!
“When he beat a ‘peak form’ Foreman”?
Below is an indication of the tricks Ali used to get up to against his opponents back then.
‘Before he had even left the United States, Ali warned Foreman that “my African brothers are going to cook you in a pot and eat you,” and once he reached Kinshasa he continued a relentless campaign calculated to isolate the champion and turn a fight he described as “the Rumble in the Jungle” into a home game for himself.
Foreman, newly divorced, had brought along his dog to keep him company, blissfully unaware that the Alsatian -- what we in this country would describe as a German Police Dog -- was the breed the Belgian police had used in crowd-control operations during the colonial era. At every opportunity, Ali referred to Foreman’s pet as a “Belgian Shepherd.”
Ali and his entourage were quartered in the luxurious presidential villas at N’sele. Foreman, though the champion, was assigned housing at a military complex, surrounded by barbed wire and manned guard towers, and had every appearance of being a prison.
Not that Foreman seemed anxious to leave and mingle with the natives, but he did find the atmosphere so stifling that he eventually moved into a Kinshasa hotel. (There, having spurned the military guard provided by the government, he was obliged to reach into his own pocket to pay for round-the-clock security.)
Ali, on the other hand, made it a point to court the favor of the locals. He made frequent forays into the cities and towns, and even to small villages. Even in places that had never known electricity he was instantly recognized and embraced by the natives.
The chant “Ali Bomaye!” -- a phrase in the Ngala tongue meaning, literally, “Ali, kill him!” -- became his clarion call.
The sum effect was to create the widespread impression that the Congolese people considered Ali one of their own, and Foreman a hostile invader.
That Ali seemed to spend much of his daily training laying against the ropes while his sparring partners flailed away was considered unremarkable; he often conserved his energy the same way back at Deer Lake.
Foreman, on the other hand, seemed to regard his training sessions as an opportunity to vent his rage, which he took out on his sparring partners. Eight days before the bout, he was sparring with Bill McMurry, who, trapped against the ropes, saw Foreman coming at him and threw up his arms to protect himself . One of his elbows caught the champion above his eye, just below the headgear, and blood immediately spurted forth from the cut.
Word of the injury to the champion spread like wildfire. It was shortly confirmed that the fight would be postponed for a month. Trainer Dick Sadler had immediately patched the wound with a butterfly, but Foreman voiced hope of flying to Europe to have the injury treated by a specialist in France or Belgium. Mobutu, fearing that if Foreman were allowed to leave Zaire he might never return (“and he was right about that,” Foreman says today), refused permission for either fighter to leave the country during the delay.
Foreman viewed this restraint as one more indication that the field had been tilted in Ali’s favor, but the truth of the matter is that Ali was almost as anxious to get away from monkey meat as Foreman was.
Once it became clear that he wasn’t going anywhere, Ali continued to train, and the extra month gave him time to achieve a level of fitness he hadn’t approached since before his exile.
Foreman told himself he was doing it to guard against re-opening the cut, but between the date of the injury and the night of the fight, he didn’t spar a single round.’
I agree. Ali was not even close to the greatest boxer ever..just the greatest talker.
'While the likes of Frazier and Foreman have still got all their marbles and are perfectly healthy.
Frazier died 2 years ago
ukathleticscoach wrote:
'While the likes of Frazier and Foreman have still got all their marbles and are perfectly healthy.
Frazier died 2 years ago
At least he died lucid and articulate, not who, for all his ‘greatness’ will die in the same state as the old broken down, punch-drunk bums of previous eras.
Joe Binks wrote:
At least he died lucid and articulate, not who, for all his ‘greatness’ will die in the same state as the old broken down, punch-drunk bums of previous eras.
Why do you think races should be separated?
I think a lot of what the OP was talking about is captured here in a most compelling look at the bitter rivalry between Frazier and Ali.
http://www.theage.com.au/tv/Sport/Thriller-in-Manila-4302552.html
I would be interested to hear the views of previous posters after having viewed it.
lslso wrote:
Joe Binks wrote:At least he died lucid and articulate, not who, for all his ‘greatness’ will die in the same state as the old broken down, punch-drunk bums of previous eras.
Why do you think races should be separated?
One only has to look at the state of race-relations in the USA to understand why I think it is obvious that different races don’t live peacefully alongside one another.
Doesn’t have to be different races either, different languages and different religions in a single country is also usually a recipe for constant internal conflict.
As it happens, I’ve just been thumbing though Ann Coulter’s book, Mugged, which is a revelation concerning the true state of affairs race-relationwise in the USA as opposed to the Hollywood version.
And it is Hollywood’s mendacious version of the true reality in their movies and TV shows that misrepresent real life in America.
Those outside the US, if their only information of life in America came from Movies and TV, would come to the conclusion that every judge, police chief, head surgeon, computer expert, inventor and scientist in America is black.
And any group of white friends in the US predictably includes a black person - is that so?
What agenda are they in Hollywood working to?
We are all aware of who owns Hollywood.
Independence Day is a good example, the world was saved by a Jewish scientist (not impossible) and a black fighter pilot!
Imagine the USA sending a black pilot on the most important mission in the history of the world?
In reality, how long was before they allowed one to pilot the space shuttle?
And Captain Sully Sullenburger was most certainly not black, but had that been a Hollywood movie - who knows?
Incidentally, of all the scientists and engineers working in science and engineering occupations in the USA - 3% are black males.
Joe Binks wrote:
ukathleticscoach wrote:'While the likes of Frazier and Foreman have still got all their marbles and are perfectly healthy.
Frazier died 2 years ago
At least he died lucid and articulate, not who, for all his ‘greatness’ will die in the same state as the old broken down, punch-drunk bums of previous eras.
So we should actually be assessing sporting greatness in old peoples homes!
Cancel the Olympics and lets bring on the Zimmer world finals
Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee
Your hands can't hit what your eyes can't see
He also cheated on all his wives and treated women like crap.
Very very overrated.
TrackCoach wrote:
Am I missing something? wrote:Never understood this. People talk in such hushed tones about him. I've heard him referred to as "the greatest man I ever met" by many people. Why?
As far as I can tell:
1) he was a fabulous boxer. Was he really the greatest? No way. Not even close to Sugar Ray Robinson
2) he trashed talked to his opponents to a really unpleasant degree.
3) he was a conscientious objector. Is that really so amazing?
Maybe I'm missing something. He was a great athlete, but I don't get the hero worship bit at all.
Thoughts?
I am assuming you are young, if that is correct, you don't know what boxing used to be and what it meant to be the heavy weight champion during Ali's era. It was far bigger than being the fastest man in the world, the NBA MVP, Wimbledon, Masters, TDF...you were literally the biggest sportsmen on the planet. Even when you consider he gave up his most productive years, he was great purely as an athlete. Ali was the champ multiple times during an era without a doubt was the most competitive in boxing history.
His true greatness was in not compromising on something he believed in so strongly that he risked his career, fame, fortune and freedom. Perhaps this does not seem like a big deal with the passage of time, but find an athlete or any person on the planet in this day and age willing to do that. (There is no one!) The stance Ali took at the time was not popular, but in retrospect, Ali was right; why should he fight the Vietcong when they had done anything to threaten the U.S., while Blacks did not have equal rights here in America. And, as conscientious objector, he did not lie or make up anything, he did not run to Canada...his objection was on religious grounds, he was honest, upfront and willing to accept the penalty.
Ali was flamboyant and had a big mouth, while this of type behavior irks some people, I don't have a problem with it if you can back it up, which he did. Because of his big mouth, he was the world's greatest promoter for an event and went from the most hated athlete to the most beloved. People will accept your flamboyance when you are really good at what you do. And, for Black Americans, Ali was the first person most of them ever saw stand up to White people and speak his mind...this is something that you would probably have be a 50+ Black person to fully understand.
I won’t taught Ali whole life and career, you can read about that in books, but he was generous to a fault, he divorced 3 times, all of them without a prenup and was never taken to court by an ex-wife. He has assisted the U.S. government in geopolitical issues and been a great U.S. goodwill ambassador. Ali was far from perfect, he had had some of the same flaws you find in a lot of men, but he was never associated with drugs, drinking, guns any legal or antisocial issues and lived an exemplary life outside of the public arena. People like people, who are real, who stand for something and aren’t afraid to make their opinions known. And, even if you don’t agree with everything he did, you have to respect a man who stands strong in their convictions.
Ali, didn’t do anything that changed the world, but he is certainly a historical figure and deserving of his place in the world. - Hopefully this helps.
Give it a rest. Ali was not even close to the best fighter and he was terrible for what he did to Fraser. And to try to come on here and suggest he was good to women was a farce. He cheated on all of them and treated them like the scum of the earth. Watch the movie about Zaire and you will understand how terribly he treated women.
Yeah but they had a song on the radio about him. Any old timers remember that one?
"He floats like a butterfly and he stings like a bee"
"Muhammad- Muhammad Ali!"
He was larger than life and the sports media put him on a pedestal because he meant ratings.
I think he is revered now more because of sympathy to his condition.
And he beat Sonny Liston twice, split with Joe Frazier, and beat George Foreman who at the time was considered as unbeatable as a young Mike Tyson was in the 1980s. When Ali was in his thirties. He had the mouth and but he backed it up.
Its a shame he didn't retire in 1975 but the money was still there.
For those who remember it was very sad to see him go out the way he did fighting Larry Holmes in 1980.
Ali gave back as well. If you are older you might recall the Muhammad Ali track club.
If he got turds like Joe Binks and the other racist non-runners polluting this forum to hate him, he musta done something right.
100TH POST! POSTING WARS, YEAH!
watch this doco. you will change your mind. paints a very ugly picture of alihttp://www.theage.com.au/tv/Sport/Thriller-in-Manila-4302552.html
TrackCoach wrote:
I am assuming you are young, if that is correct, you don't know what boxing used to be and what it meant to be the heavy weight champion during Ali's era. It was far bigger than being the fastest man in the world, the NBA MVP, Wimbledon, Masters, TDF...you were literally the biggest sportsmen on the planet. Even when you consider he gave up his most productive years, he was great purely as an athlete. Ali was the champ multiple times during an era without a doubt was the most competitive in boxing history.
His true greatness was in not compromising on something he believed in so strongly that he risked his career, fame, fortune and freedom. Perhaps this does not seem like a big deal with the passage of time, but find an athlete or any person on the planet in this day and age willing to do that. (There is no one!) The stance Ali took at the time was not popular, but in retrospect, Ali was right; why should he fight the Vietcong when they had done anything to threaten the U.S., while Blacks did not have equal rights here in America. And, as conscientious objector, he did not lie or make up anything, he did not run to Canada...his objection was on religious grounds, he was honest, upfront and willing to accept the penalty.
Ali was flamboyant and had a big mouth, while this of type behavior irks some people, I don't have a problem with it if you can back it up, which he did. Because of his big mouth, he was the world's greatest promoter for an event and went from the most hated athlete to the most beloved. People will accept your flamboyance when you are really good at what you do. And, for Black Americans, Ali was the first person most of them ever saw stand up to White people and speak his mind...this is something that you would probably have be a 50+ Black person to fully understand.
I won’t taught Ali whole life and career, you can read about that in books, but he was generous to a fault, he divorced 3 times, all of them without a prenup and was never taken to court by an ex-wife. He has assisted the U.S. government in geopolitical issues and been a great U.S. goodwill ambassador. Ali was far from perfect, he had had some of the same flaws you find in a lot of men, but he was never associated with drugs, drinking, guns any legal or antisocial issues and lived an exemplary life outside of the public arena. People like people, who are real, who stand for something and aren’t afraid to make their opinions known. And, even if you don’t agree with everything he did, you have to respect a man who stands strong in their convictions.
Ali, didn’t do anything that changed the world, but he is certainly a historical figure and deserving of his place in the world. - Hopefully this helps.
Anyone who want’s to read a detailed study of the myth of Ali’s greatness should read ‘The Ghosts of Manila’ by Mark Kram.
‘His revisionist study explodes the myths surrounding both fighters, particularly Ali, and paints a much darker version of the legend than anyone has ever dared.’ - Daily Telegraph.
‘The definitive Ali book’ - London Times.
‘Suggesting that though Ali was a great sportsman, his latter day beautification is a sham.’ - Independent on Sunday.
Personally, I would have preferred have been in the trenches with a single Frazier than a dozen Ali’s.
Joe Binks wrote:And it is Hollywood’s mendacious version of the true reality in their movies and TV shows that misrepresent real life in America.
Those outside the US, if their only information of life in America came from Movies and TV, would come to the conclusion that every judge, police chief, head surgeon, computer expert, inventor and scientist in America is black.
And any group of white friends in the US predictably includes a black person - is that so?
What agenda are they in Hollywood working to?
We are all aware of who owns Hollywood.
Has it ever occurred to you that they are portrayed in these careers to inspire more blacks into those fields?
Here's a video not so much to display evidence why Ali was so revered, but if you watch 5-10 minutes of this interview when his mental state was still intact, it's hard to imagine any single athlete in any sport ever as more entertaining and charismatic in this format.
He loved the spotlight and was a great storyteller and if you watch the whole interview and have the ability to think, you can get an idea why Ali in that time was a major role model in the 1960's civil rights movement. And why he is so revered. And that has more to do with his boxing accomplishments.