(Snippet from the “How I would clobber Clay” by Joe Louis. I’d press him, bang him around, claw him, clobber him with all I got, cut down his speed, belt him around the ribs. I’d punish the body, where the pain comes real bad. I know I can still feel the triphammers Rocky Marciano hit me with when he knocked me out when he was on the way up and I was on the way out. Clay would have welts on his body like I did. He would ache, like I did. His mouth would shut tight against the pain and there would be tears burning his eyes. It is not very funny being under fire from body punches, and it wouldn’t help Clay any looking for his trainer, Angelo Dundee, to come riding into the ring with a rescue posse. Those guys in the corner fight good during the intervals, but they can’t give you any more fists or any more heart when some guy’s caving your ribs in. “Kill the body and the head will die,” Chappie used to tell me. It figures. Sooner or later, I think Clay would get the message. Get it so good that he’d stop worrying about that face of his and drop his left hand like he did against Mildenberger and George Chuvalo. Those fellows got their opening by accident, and then fouled it up. I would work for it, and I wouldn’t reckon to miss it when it arrived. Norton: A lot of it was the mental part of it. Ali defeated everyone mentally first. With Frazier, Ali had him so mad Joe was trying to kill him with every shot. With Foreman, he tried to kill him with every shot. Mentally, Ali could not defeat me and physically I felt I was as much a physical power as Ali was. He couldn’t upset me in any way and plus, I had Eddie Futch. Eddie knew how to fight Ali. You can’t go to the head with him. You have to go to the body first and then eventually he will bring his hands down and lower his head.
I admire Joe Louis greatly but if he is talking about fighting the Ali of 1964 through 1967 then his plan has a serious flaw. He is not going to be able to hit Ali often enough for the effects of his punches to do the damage he's hoping for.
Joe would have too consistently gotten close to Ali to do damage. Prime Ali would be too elusive and Joe would be sniped from a distance. UD for Ali is my opinion.
The problem that I have is that I don’t believe Ali was the same after the exile…so I don’t necessarily see Norton or Frazier as blue prints on how to beat him in his prime ..IMHO
Why not? - Ali was less intelligent and not much faster- he looked better because he was getting away with a lot of stuff, the disappearance of his legs post 60s had everything to do with better competition and Ali smartening up IMO.
My next thread will be a thesis on "Why Galento was better than a prime Muhammad Ali and how Ali would lose to Tony Galento"
That's right, mate. Yes there's a chance he could nail Ali, as Cooper did, but I don't see him getting a chance to lay anything on him.
