I thought at first this was a blow out and ali was dominated but then i heard some people thought ali deserved the verdict. I never watched this fight
Ali wasn't totally dominated -- he won a few rounds and made others close -- but he looked like utter s**t against Berbick. Muhammad was clumsy and slow, and he could barely put punches together. Berbick was crude and unpolished -- but he was strong and busy.
I didn't keep score, but I thought it was much closer than the media reported it as being. Frankly, it was very hard to score. Berbick had a lot of trouble connecting cleanly, and Ali landed lots of slapping blows in return. It's true that Ali looked like a pathetic shell of his once great self in this fight. Maybe the media was overfocused on this fact, and that's why they overlooked the reality that the bout was closely contested.
It was indeed closer than what some have described over the years, but there were points in that fight where it looked ugly as Ali laid on the ropes while Berbick dug in. No robbery though. Berbick won the fight.
this poor version of ali was still competitive vs peak berbick, imagine the beating that a 64-67 ali would give to him... and berbick lasted the full fight vs a peak holmes... NO WAY BERBICK IS LASTING THE DISTANCE VS A PRIME ALI
Ali was competitive but nobody can seriously suggest that he actually won ! Berbick took six rounds and shared one in my view.
You simply can't watch Ali/Berbick without resorting to Tyson/Berbick straight afterwards with utter enjoyment (no offense Trev RIP)