Did Ali cheat against Foreman?

Correct. The original fight date was for 24th September 1974. George's injury pushed it back to 30th October.

 

Well no, Foreman had to fly back to the states to get treated so he didn't have "plenty of time to acclimatize".

 

Thanks for the tip. I didn't know that.

 

I could have sworn he stayed. The thought was if he left the fight would unravel and not take place.

This was the debut in the world’s consciousness of the butterfly bandage — he didn’t get stitches because they healed it with the butterfly (it wasn’t a super major cut but he couldn’t have fought until it healed as it would have been ripped open).

Ali did the famous ‘the man want out’ speech, telling people to stand guard at the airport and search all elephant caravans at the border, haha.

I’m pretty positive George stayed in Zaire. Maybe my memory is wrong but if my recollection is correct it’s addressed thoroughly in Normal Mailer’s “The Fight” book account of this epic event.

 

Yes, I think you’re correct that Foreman was more or less forced to stay in Zaire. This apparently effected him mentally somewhat. I’m not plying that as any form of excuse - it would be natural for Foreman to want to return home in the interim - he wasn’t exactly the welcome one there - culminating in the chant during the fight “Ali, Bomaye” (read: Ali, kill him). Gulp!

 

I believe Ali also labeled Foreman as “the Great White Hope” — maybe he meant it as ‘he’s the champion supported by white people’ but remember George has lighter skin and it’s not like the average person in Zaire is going to see him up close enough to notice … not sure what level of color TV coverage there was there or even newspaper pictures, but I think a majority of the natives rooting for Ali (who embraced his African roots and seemed to draw nourishment from his surroundings) thought George was the embodiment of the white devil.

 

For sure, and Ali made no mean contribution to the negative perceptions of Foreman - as Ali, more than revealingly, had wont to do in the face of opposition that posed uniquely serious and significant threat.

 

I’m not sure we see that the same way, or maybe I don’t understand you.

To me, Ali was wont to ‘poke the bear’ (or the mummy or the grilla) when he faced the most serious opposition — he didn’t play nice or try to shower them with platitudes or hope to not further motivate them … if anything he did just the opposite. He wanted them fired up, trained up and coming with both barrels. He never shied away from trying to get a man to come with everything he had.

Now if you do that with a lesser foe — someone like Jurgen Blinn — you’re just belittling someone and being a bully. But if you say things to Sonny Liston or Joe Frazier or George Foreman to make them want to tear you limb from limb … that’s a remarkable thing.

I think he did that sort of thing maybe to some degree to have them seeing red so maybe they’d be reckless, but also to back himself into a corner so he had to bring his best and be ready to fight to the death, so to speak. He never tried to lull top opposition to sleep … just the opposite.

 

We may not see it the same way - but that’s cool.

It’s a good spark for examination of the whys and wherefores behind Ali’s behaviours.

I’ll just say (all just imo of course):-

It was psychological warfare at every level.

It was meant to denigrate and mentally impair the opposition.

It was also meant to win favour whilst drumming up disfavour toward the opposition.

That lent further external motivational support to Ali and the very opposite to his opposition.

I don’t think Ali wanted or expected Frazier coming at him like Joe did in Manila.

Ali thought Frazier was damaged goods, washed up and was looking to KO Frazier early to mid - flat footed and really gunning for Joe.

All Ali’s talk before and specifically in the lead up to Manila gave Frazier more than enough motivation - far more than what Ali was bargaining for, if Ali was negotiating for any hurt from Joe at all.

A Jurgen Blin posed no where near the threat - that’s the true correlate - thus no smack talk or psychological warfare required.

Possibly an exception or contradiction to my own terms with the caveat that it was on a personally aggrieved, maliciously intended level (as opposed to psychological warfare). but Ali was particularly cruel toward Patterson also - and, at least imo, he did come across as a bully in that instance.

 

I agree it was psychological warfare … Ali was a master at it.

But IMO it was meant not only to psyche the opponent out (make him see red and come in recklessly) but also to psyche himself up.

I think he purposely raised the ante because he needed to do so to make himself work as hard and fight as hard as necessary to rise to challenges. He needed to know Joe and George and Sonny were going to come at him with gusto so he could do the work far away from the spotlight that wins the fight. He had to get himself in war mode and also train like he was going to war … hard to do if you let yourself think the opponent isn’t coming for blood.

As for Floyd, I think that was personal. Ali takes the rap but Patterson is the guy who said, basically, that Ali wasn’t an American (Floyd literally said he would bring the title back to America) and that Ali’s religion was garbage (think what you will of Ali and he was certainly a human with human frailties and weaknesses, but he completely gave his life to Islam at a time when that wasn’t often done, especially by a marketable, high-profile athlete that had so much to lose by making himself a villain) and Floyd more than touched a nerve there — especially considering Patterson wore his Catholicism on his sleeve (a religion that had started wars to wipe out non-believers, ran torture chambers — the Spanish Inquisition for one — for those who didn’t subscribe to their beliefs and, we now know to a much greater degree, protected hundreds if not thousands of pedophiles in their ranks). Nah, Floyd invited that.

I fail to see how Ali calling Terrell an Uncle Tom or doing the gorilla thing with Frazier or whatever he said about Foreman was supposed to turn the public against those people. Mostly it turned them against Ali. He wore the black hat, so to speak. Yes, in Zaire he took advantage of his embrace of Africa but I don’t think he was trying to curry popular favor — more like ‘I’m one of you and he’s not’ because he really did connect with his roots there.

 

Again, sure. The psychological warfare angle can and did coexist with Ali’s smack talk also constituting itself as mantra-like, self affirmations.

It was funny to see Ali sometimes get so deep into his rants that he would close his eyes, as if feeding back all he was saying to himself to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince anyone else. Lol.

Agree re Patto in so far as it being personal - which is what I said in my prior post. True, Patto said his stuff too - though Ali was the outstanding common denominator for sh*t talk.

I still think Ali did attempt to engender greater favour toward himself than his opposition - though of course this pan out in every instance.

For instance, at least as far as black supporters went, labelling Terrell as an Uncle Tom - as he also labelled Patterson for another example at the least, as I recall, - was definitely a ME, US vs THEM angle.

He definitely played it the same against Foreman in Zaire. Ali got the support he sought and he very much used that support to lift and buoy his performance.

 

Hi Saint.
Picking up on your last paragraph and the assertion that " it turned them against Ali " if only that were true, at the time I am sorry to say that " the people " were very much in Ali,s corner, he was so mesmerising and evangelical, that we were all caught up in his embrace, we thought yea that Terrell was a Uncle Tom, as was Frazier, both fighting for the white man, both taking the white man's dollar to vanquish the true and only black man, fighting for his roots and ancestry, and his people, oh how the boxing world laughed when Ali started to employ his Gorilla routine, shamefully nodding their heads in agreement, only with the passage of time have we realised that Alis barbed remarks and comments had no place in sport, in particular his verbal onslaught on the quiet spoken Frazier, and more importantly on Joe's family, who bore the brunt of the most insulting jibes, of course a lot of Ali's comments and fake hurt were done to booster the gate, as they most certainly did, also some were said in fake anger, but not all, Ali is viewed now as a truly great fighter, both in the ring, and on the political stage, and rightly so, but there was also a side to him that was cruel and spiteful on occasions.
chat soon buddy, stay safe.

 

And what is the truth now? Did the foreman stay in Zaire the whole time, or did he leave. In the movie "Ali" Foreman stays in Zaire.
I can't possibly know because I was born the year "Rumble in the Jungle" took place, so even if I was inseparable with George Foreman the whole time, I would hardly remember anything.

 

I also remember that both Muhammad and George stayed in Zaire.

 

Interesting. I’ve retained memories going all the way back to my brief zygote phase…anyway.

If I’ve counted correctly, in the 8th paragraph down it states that both fighters and many journalists remained in the country (Zaire).

While looking for confirmation of same I read that Bill McMurray (same who fought Liston?) was the sparring partner who cut Foreman’s eye. I didn’t know that or over sighted prior to becoming aware of the Liston vs McMurray fight.

There was contention as to whether is it was a punch or accidental elbow that caused the cut.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/arch...e-loser/d7221203-3e5f-4c40-9dab-3448ed48e140/