It's been a long time since I've looked at a copy of Jack's autobiography, but there's a picture of Joe standing beside him in the ring at MSG during Dempsey's 75th birthday celebration, holding a gift for Jack. (What impressed me about that shot is how much bigger Dempsey was.) Before the FOTC, Jack reportedly predicted that Frazier would knock Ali out.
Joe Frazier was a boxing hero and sadly over-rated because of Ali and his destruction at the hands of Foreman, but he was a truly great fighter and a great man .. You have to be great if your one half of the greatest rivalry in sporting history .. It really pisses me off when people spend they're time waxing lyrical about average fighters like Wlad, Vitali and Lennox .. These big lumbering guys who scared to take a shot and bore everyone to death by cautiously sitting behind the jab for 10 rounds before they release a right hand, im still shaking my head at Lennox Lewis for his performance against Tua and thats gotta be nearly 10 years ago. Tua had nothing, Lennox jabbed and jabbed and jabbed for 12 rounds, too scared to open up in case Tua launched his left hand .. That was painful to watch, theres nothing worse than a heavyweight fighter who is scared of taking a punch, that is Vitali, Wlad and Lewis .... Frazier and Marciano are proper fighters, proper sporting heroes as is Ali ....
Im more interested in what the older fighters thought of Ali. Its impossible not to like Frazier as a man and a fighter, he was a fighters fighter .. I could be mistaken but im sure ive read things in the past that suggest Ali was disliked by just about any old time fighter, Marciano, Dempsey, Louis etc .. Can anyone give me any solid info on this ?? and was it just fighters siding with the 'establishment' in their dislike of Ali, was it his mouth, or was it that he was so good that they didnt want to admit it ??
He rubbed Louis and Robinson up the wrong way but it cut both ways. He gave Louis a lot of money when he needed it. Jersey Joe Walcott was his biggest proponent and was second only to Ali himself in proclaiming him the greatest. Jack Dempsey rated Ali verry highly early in his career and had high hopes that he would create public interest in the heavyweight division. Although a lot of old timers hated Ali's politics his charm as a man entranced them to some extent.
It is well known that early on Joe Louis placed Cassius Clay alongside Johnny Paycheck, constantly putting Clay down, and constantly getting embarrassed as a prognosticator. By the time of the Terrell fight, Louis had to admit Ali was a great fighter, but he never ceased to believe he would lick him. http://coxscorner.tripod.com/alilouis.html Marciano said: "I don't consider Clay's decision to fight Sonny Liston very smart," yet he was one of the first excited people to enter the ring in Miami when Liston remained on his stool. He also said Ali did things that, as a fighter, "looked good" against Chuvalo in Canada. And he was proved wrong yet again during Ali's exile, advising Belinda Ali: "Tell Muhammad to stop torturing himself. Get him out of boxing, and forget the whole thing." To which the feisty Belinda replied, "He won it in the ring, and he'll lose it in the ring. That's the only way he'll give up the crown." And Archie Moore: "As his [Ali's] career progressed, we began to bring his name up against Joe Louis, and I believe in my mind and heart that Ali would have beaten Joe. If they'd fought five times, I believe Ali would have won four. The only man that I could see - and I've only seen him perform on old motion pictures - the only man that I could see Ali not being able to beat might be Jack Johnson, because Johnson was a dancing man himself. Jack Johnson was a defensive man. He was a hard hitter and a master boxer."
noway frazier was a shot when he faced foreman, he was 29 years old and undefeated. He was not the best frazier 70 but he was very good.
He wasn't peak but yeah he wasn't shot, Foreman was just a stylistic nightmare for him and would have been for any swarming heavyweight, be it Tyson, Marciano or Dempsey.
oh thats just hogwash. Frazier could no longer cope with big hitters after the first ali fight. george was too hard of a puncher coming after what joe went through to win TFOTC. smoke should have retired like marciano did.
to face george foreman twice(the worst match for a short puncher), ali 3 times and to fight partially blind is nothing compared with To retire with 32 years old to do not lose , it is an act of incredible courage.
