"here we go....here we go.....anytime the zaire fight comes up some ali knocker drags the heat in the ring outa their ass..."
Apologies to Eddie Murphy As I've always said,there were TWO fighters battling it out in the Zaire heat,
:good It's all a conspiracy,Kalasinn. Ali was cheating,as he was n't really in Kinshasa with George. Ali was in Madison Square Garden,in cool Autumnal weather,throwing his long punches and hitting George,who was in Zaire.
But that magic wasn't enough, Ali also drugged Foreman with enough deadly snake poison to kill an elephant!
George Foreman "Sure I was doped...by Muhammad's punches" Muhammad Ali "It was n't the African weather,it was the Ali leather"
First of all... Foreman would have beat Norton 999 out of 1000 times... but I do believe that Norton was having some serious out of the ring problems going into the fight with Foreman. He really had no fight plan vs. Foreman. Vs. Ali x3 he got in great shape mentally and physically and had a good fight plan. I think Norton could have done better in a rematch but Foreman most likely would have stopped him again. Norton fought 3 close fights with Ali (winning 1 but most felt he won at least 2 out of 3). He lost a split-decision with Holmes. He beat Quarry, Young, and others. He went 1-3 vs. Ali and Holmes (#1 and #2 on many all-time great HW lists) but could have just as easily had gone 4-0 vs. them... that's pretty much the reason for the Hall of Fame induction.
The heat was probably the reason why Foreman lost to Jimmy Young as well . Not claiming Young or his team cheated but it was a decisive factor nonetheless . In addition to the heat , Ali's team cheated by having a bigger ring's ropes installed in the smaller ring . Ali made an extensive use of it , making some of Foreman's punches miss and very much helping Ali in absorbing the rest better than what could happen with tight/er ropes. Ali rematched many people and rubber matched 3 , but not George Foreman. Just 3 facts.
Frank,the same question comes up here - What strange Harry Potter like phenomenal piece of magic made Ali and Young immune to the heat ? And why did this piece of occult impedimentia bypass Foreman ? After the third fights with Frazier and Norton,the 35 year old Ali decided to take things a bit easier (?) so Foreman 2 did n't come off. Anyway,George got beaten by Young (and the heat ) so it ceased to be relevant. Muhammad's people did offer a return to George in '75 but Foreman's people did n't bite. Coming to think of it,out of Foreman,Frazier and Norton,George is the one whom Ali woul;d have expected the LEAST problem with. Going on the first two with Ken and Joe,and the one with George.
Ali and Young barely through punches , George wasted energy and therefore got heated by punching a lot in addition to the chasing. In Ali's case he didn't even exert much energy on running away as he just employed the rope-a-dope to both avoid and absorb punches easier than other tactics/the same rope-a-dope with legit ropes. This content is protected
Good post. Norton boxed decently for the first round, but it was only a matter of time before Foreman caught him. Norton wasn't the best counterpuncher and couldn't move laterally quick enough to put Foreman off balance like Jimmy Young did.
George was cheated. Ali probably knew beforehand about the cheat and was prepared , trained and told how to exploit it. After all it was his team responsible for it. read my post again . I didn't claim nor meant that Ali was smarter. George is a stupid man . He can "admit" whatever he wants and respect whomever he chooses to , but he was just cheated , nothing more . And while I don't consider his loss to Young a result of a cheat , I do use it as additional evidence that George was suspect to heat exhaustion .
Ironically, Foreman has admitted many a time that HE was in actual fact, afraid of Norton! I wonder if Kenny knew this at the time?