Foreman never hit Ali with his best shot, right?

Ali fought too long but if athletes quit at their absolute apex most of them would retire at 30. That's when your lens start to thicken, your reflexes slow, and your fat to muscle raio increases.

 

I just bought a book on Ali that weighs 15 pounds and it's the slim version . The regular version weighs 65 pounds! Anyway there are really high resolution pictures of him from the Rumble. He came in at 216 pounds and had close to a six pack. Ali was in great shape for Frazier ll. Norton ll, and lll. Even for Spinks ll though he was essentially washed he came into the ring in as good a shape as a washed fighter in the early stages of Parkinson's could be. He would always rise to the occasion until he couldn't.

 

I remember watching the Ali vs Patterson I on November 22 1965, live on Closed Circuit Television.

 

The big surprise was how well Ali could take body shots. Everyone knew he had the whiskers but taking body punches from a Chuvalo is not the same as getting hit with Foreman's shots. But the clue's were there from the Norton fight--it was hard to hurt Ali to the body.

Ali took body punishment better than any other heavyweight. And he had the whiskers to take it upstairs. The other factor is the style of Ali takes away the Foreman left and right uppercuts. Back then, if you had a chance with George you cannot get hit with his uppercuts. Not a punch to land on an Ali.

What terrific condition Ali was in as well--without that, he could have lost the fight.

 

That was more of an American thing. There was a sense in the UK that Foreman was being a tad overrated and hadn’t been tested enough by a smart boxer. Even then enough top US sports writers predicted Ali would win, its just the ‘miracle’ story sells more magazines.

 

He took a lot of body shots vs Chualo during the prime years too, which proved to be good prep for the Frazier fight.

 

I often suggest that he purposely exposed his body to Chuvalo to squash the noise about him being 'soft'. I don't think I've ever seen a heavyweight take bodyshots as well as Ali seemed to - Holyfield, who's has been lauded as a comparable chin, was visibly disturbed and hurt to the body on more than one occasion.

One of Ali's biggest gifts and biggest flaws were that he could fight down or up to the perceived threat of the opponent - had him endure a lot more punishment than he should have.

 

Ali said he was out om his feet twice during the fight. So George did connect but obviously not flush.

 

It was a tremendous punching display by Ali - and it one of the rare times when, as Ali confirmed, he had absolutely no problems with his hands going in - including during training when he might’ve otherwise had to curtail his work on the heavy bag some time prior to a fight.

Atop that, the full extent of the quality of Foreman’s chin was not yet proven and or fully appreciated - as history played out, including Foreman’s comeback, during which he wasn’t even put down - Ali retained the distinction of being the only man to put George down for the full 10 count.

 

Whilst true, and despite me being a massive Ali fan, I don't think that any other fighter gets the fight called in the way it was. I dunno whether George was completely down for 10 - Ali would've finished him if it was allowed to continue but yeah, I could be wrong ...

 

Agree with that, but it’s hard to keep away from a bull for 15 rounds anyway, underrated performance from both of them, really…on the Holy thing, maybe, but Evander was fighting much bigger guys than himself, mind.

 

He looks like he gets up in time and he’d have seen the bell but probably been stopped in the next round, as he looked like he didn’t have much left. But the stoppage, as predicted by the majority of the staff at Boxing News, had much to do with George running out of gas.

 

Yep, partly bigger guys, partly the fact that despite the elixirs getting him to an impressive physique, you can't bulk up the cruiserweight natural frame. Holy always had a small waist and well, as you say, a small guy getting hit by bigger guys to a naturally smaller frame - yikes.