While still bearing his birth
name Cassius Clay, only once did the teenaged Muhammad Ali get into trouble at
Louisville’s Central High School. It was when he also showed accuracy with a
snowball, hitting a teacher with it and getting summoned by the disciplinary
board. After expressing his sincere apology, he calmly declared to the
three-man board that he was on his way to becoming boxing’s heavyweight
champion of the world. He might as well have prophesied then that he would be
esteemed as The Greatest.
Born January 17, 1942 in
Louisville, Kentucky and named Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. after his father,
Ali’s life in boxing began 12 years later when his bicycle was stolen. The
adolescent momentarily left his Schwinn bike at a street corner in Louisville,
Kentucky to indulge on free popcorn offered by the yearly Home Show. When he
came back, his ride was gone.
Upon learning that there was a
police officer at a nearby gym, the distraught black boy ran toward it and was
enthralled by the sight of boys – black and white – training in boxing. It
turned out that the police officer was off-duty, a white man named Joe Martin
who also coached in boxing.
An infuriated Ali reported,
“Somebody stole my bike…when I find him, I’m gonna whup him, I’m gonna.” Martin
asked, “Do you know how to box?”
Ali never recovered his bike, but
he discovered a sport. Under Martin, his journey in mastering and innovating
boxing, and becoming the world’s unparalleled icon of the sport, began.
For much of the second half of
the 20th century until his passing last June 3, 2016 at age 74,
people all over the world knew and revered two living Alis: the courageous and
talented fighter inside the ring, and the loud, witty and handsome spokesperson
against social injustice and inequality outside of it.
The following are the most
significant highlights, the wins and losses, of The Greatest -- within and
without the ring:
Olympic gold. Muhammad Ali won the gold medal in the 1960 Rome
Olympics as athlete of the US Olympic boxing team, beating Zbigniew Pietrzkowski of Poland for the
championship.
Twin victories over the fearsome Sonny Liston. After breezing
through 17 professional fights, Ali finally signed the dotted line to challenge
for the heavy-hitting reigning champion Liston. The odds were 7-1 in favor of
the champ. With his superior hand speed and footwork, Ali battered Liston into
submission, who refused to rise from his stool for the seventh round. Thus, the
22-year-old Ali was officially crowned as the new heavyweight king.
Fifteen months later, Ali
defended his title in quicker and more decisive fashion, disposing of the man
he wrested the belt from in less than two minutes via the famous (or infamous)
“phantom punch”.
Stopping former champ Floyd Patterson. For the scheduled 15-round
match, Ali effectively landed his jabs on the game but devastatingly
overmatched Patterson, until the referee mercifully stopped the carnage in the 12th.
(He beat Patterson again, via knockout, in a rematch years later.)
The Trilogy versus Smokin’ Joe Frazier, culminating in the Thrilla in
Manila. Regaining his boxing license in 1970 – three-and-a-half (athletically)
inactive years after losing it along with his belt as punishments for his controversial
refusal to be conscripted in the US military during the War in Vietnam – Ali
was set to face Frazier, who was then his successor as the heavyweight
champion.
Abandoning his erstwhile
signature fleet-footed style, Ali chose to square and bang with the formidable
banger Frazier. In the 15th round of the grueling and gruesome
affair, the defending champion knocked Ali down, who got up and lost via
unanimous decision.
In the rematch, Ali turned the
tables on Frazier; this time, he won the 12-round unanimous decision.
Finally, the 1975 Thrilla in
Manila: regarded as one of the best fights of all time. It was a hard-fought 14
rounds of give-and-take, with Frazier’s trainer Eddie Futch ultimately waiving
off his battered boxer from fighting for the 15th and ultimate round.
The likewise severely-punished Ali, after emerging victorious, claimed that he
himself was on the verge of quitting, and that going through that fight was the
closest thing to death.
Rumble in the Jungle versus Big George Foreman. In 1974, a year
before his third and final fight versus Frazier, Ali was again the
underdog. This time, he was pitted
against the man who was generally considered as his most formidable opponent: the
unstoppable reigning champion Foreman who previously knocked down another juggernaut in Frazier
-- six times until their match was stopped in the second round, grabbing the
latter’s title.
Using the “rope-a-dope strategy”
– leaning against the ropes while covering and defending with his flexed arms, frustrating
and wearying Foreman who eventually outpunched himself – he finally knocked out
the heavy favorite with five consecutive unanswered bombs in the eighth.
His last losses. Ali lost his title to Leon Spinks in 1978, in what
was then popularly deemed as an upset by boxing fans. Ali regained his title seven months later, which
made him the first to win the heavyweight belt three times. Hence, the
obviously fading boxing great “retired” for the first time.
Tragically, and allegedly largely
due to promoter Don King’s self-serving pecuniary machinations, an undeniably
withered Ali donned his gloves two more times, and lost to Larry Holmes (1980)
then to Trevor Berbick (1981) in consecutive sorry displays of lost power and
virtuosity inside the ring.
The Greatest ended his pugilistic
career with a 56-5 win-loss record, including his defeat to Ken Norton in 1973,
who dealt him a broken jaw. (Ali faced Norton two more times, winning both
rematches.)
Ali vis-à-vis the burning issues of the US-Vietnam War, race, and
religion.
“I ain’t got nothing against them
Viet Cong.” Ali’s powerful statement on his refusal to be drafted to serve the
US armed forces in the US-Vietnam war was part principled defiance based on his
religious beliefs as a Muslim along with his opposition to what that war stood for, and part
exasperation after being grilled non-stop by reporters on the issue.
According to Robert Lipsyte in
his cover article on Ali (for the June 20, 2016 commemorative issue of TIME Magazine),
on that particular day, news truck after news truck arrived at Ali’s rented
bungalow in Miami from afternoon to dusk. And, reporter after reporter, every
newcomer, pressed the champion for his thoughts “about the Viet Cong.” The nth
and final time he was asked, he finally snapped with that immortal line of
protest.
On another occasion, Ali asked,
“What can you give me, America, for turning down my religion? You want me to do
what the white man says and go fight a war against some people I don’t know
nothing about, get some freedom for some other people when my own can’t get
theirs here?” (Seven years earlier, immediately after winning Olympic gold, a
segregated restaurant in his very hometown refused to serve him.)
In 1967, as a consequence of his
draft refusal, boxing commissioners stripped him of his championship belt and denied
him his license to fight. Then, a jury hastily convicted him of draft evasion.
His conversion to Islam came the
morning after beating Liston in their first encounter in 1964. Exercising his
religious freedom, Ali confirmed membership in the Nation of Islam.
Ali, writes Lipsyte in his abovementioned
piece, “was turning his back on mainstream religion, politics and commerce. He
was making a powerful statement in the turbulent 1960s as race riots swept
cities, voter-registration workers were attacked and murdered … and the Vietnam
War was expanding … Ali was now seen as an outspoken agent of change.”
In 1970, a federal court ordered
the New York State Athletic Commission to give Ali his license to fight. And,
the following year, the US Supreme Court reversed his conviction.
Ali and Parkinson’s disease.
When Ali died, he had long been
suffering from Parkinson’s disease. The disease rendered his once voluble
speech barely audible, and shaking involuntarily as with the rest of his once
agile body. This debilitating condition had already shown its signs in the
legend even before his last fight in 1981. (No conclusive findings showed that
Ali developed the disease due to getting repeatedly struck in the head, though
there is data that repeated brain trauma makes one more likely to suffer from Parkinson’s.)
The legacy of The Greatest.
Unlike the Filipino loving legend Manny Pacquiao, Ali didn’t seek any elective
political office, though in 1979 he played the role of a senator in post-Civil
War USA in a TV miniseries. He didn’t become a congressman, but his influence
led to the enactment of the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act, a federal law that
primarily seeks to protect the rights and welfare of boxers.
To quote his fellow Muslim and
black sports legend, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, “Out of the ring, he was a champion
of justice. Had Muhammad allowed himself to be drafted, he would have never
faced combat and would have still earned his millions. Instead, he would face
the punishment for his convictions alone. He willingly stood up for us (African
Americans) whenever and wherever bigotry or injustice arose, without regard for
the personal cost. I and millions of Americans black and white…have been better
off because of him.”
Indeed, the USA and the rest of
the world are better off because of the struggles and sacrifices of heroes like
Muhammad Ali.
*Note: All quotes are originally from the TIME Magazine commemorative
issue of June 20, 2016, from the articles “Muhammad Ali became a big brother to
me – and to all African Americans” by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and “Ali: Champion.
Outcast. Hero. Legend.” By Robert Lipsyte.
