How I Scored All Of Muhammad Ali's Controversial Decisions

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This is pretty much as I have it, with Ali-Young and Ali-Norton 3 switched around. It's also quite in line with how they were viewed at the time and how they are viewed by fans today going by The Eye of The Ring, the last three as "could go either way" fights. I don't think any of them were as controversial as Louis-Walcott 1 for example.

 

Score for these fights by rounds according to the gospel of Stevie G -

Ali-Jones: 6-4 Ali.
Ali-Norton II: 7-5 Ali
Ali-Young: 8-7 Young
Ali-Norton III: 9-6 Norton
Ali-Shavers: 8-6-1 Ali

At last viewing.

A lot of rounds in these bouts were very close - the Young and third Norton fights were very messy to score. As much as I love Ali,he was very lucky in the 1976 bouts.

 

I’m Ali’s biggest fan only seen the fight once at the time and I thought Young won the fight.

 

Yeah, this is the one I think Ali was the most fortunate with. Some of the cards were crazy from memory.

 

D, saw the Ali-Young fight live and because of that I can't get myself to watch it again. So I'm subbing the first Norton fight in its place if you don't mind as, it too was a controversial split decision. So here we go. As always I score on the scoring system used at the time, so the Jones, Shavers and 3rd fight with Norton are on the NY scoring and the first two Norton fights are on the California scoring.

Ali-Jones - 5-4-1 Ali
Ali-Norton I - 7-5 Norton
Ali-Norton II - 7-3 Ali
Ali-Norton III - 7-7-1 Draw
Ali-Shavers - 7-6-2 Shavers

 

So all the hotly contested decisions were from when he was washed, save for the one when he was green.

 

We can make a case my man Kenny was robbed in the II and III bout.

Unfortunately the last part of Ali's career was tragically flawed by the propaganda and money machine: Ali was so popular by then that he had to keep wiining even if he was washed up, and certainly the judges used to incline the scales in his favor.

 

Their is literally 0 case, Norton was robbed in their second bout. At a push you can say Norton deserved to win on the cards, and even then it's still a very weak case. I made a poll years ago regarding this fight and Ali got triple the votes, with some who voted for Norton saying in the comments they thought my thread was referring to the third bout. Norton VS Ali II | Boxing News 24 Forum (boxingforum24.com)

Their's literally zero case to be made, that not only was Norton not fortunate to not get the decision, but he won so convincingly to the point where it was a flat out robbery. Not even Norton would agree with such an absurd statement. He himself said the 2nd fight could've gone either way, and in another interview agreed Ali cinched it by winning the last round.

 

No robbery but there was, apparently, a ringside poll calling it- 8 Ali, 6 Norton 1 even, so many disagreements (Ring magazine had it even).

Conclusive for sure....still, how many of those were at ringside? Not many I imagine. But many of those right next to the action saw a close fight, probably because of the heavier punches typically being landed by Kenneth.

Well, hardly anyone says he was robbed, really. Most have it every close. You don't obviously. But Ali could do nothing but let out a long series of farts and you'd award him the round.

He originally thought he should have won, changed it years later, like many often do. Probably when he felt he was robbed in Yankee Stadium (backed up by a 17-4 margin of sportswriters at ringside in a New York Post poll). Although Kenny felt it was very close- he's right, it was.

 

I will be uploading the Young, Shavers and Norton fights to my channel this week, starting with the Young bout. For what it's worth, I thought Norton beat Ali three times, but they were close fights and the judges went with the money.

https://www.dailymotion.com/20thCenturyBox

 

You appear to be mistaken. This was the post I was responding to "We can make a case my man Kenny was robbed in the II and III bout." Their is a case (rather weak case but one nonetheless) that Norton deserved the decision in the second bout. Their is no case he won convincingly to such an extent it would constitute a robbery.

I don't remember him saying he thought he won that fight. I remember him conceding he gave the fight away, by going easy in the last round and only giving himself a draw in the 15th round in their trilogy bout (though he also thought he'd built such a lead, that he shouldn't have even needed the 15th to win the fight0)

 

That was Dick Young of the NY Daily News. A notorious Ali hater and the biggest Ahole in sports journalism at that time.

That bout was very close. Arthur Mercante was the referee (probably the most well respected ref ever) and he stated later it was the closest bout he ever worked.

Several weeks later the bout was shown on national TV prime time with a panel of boxing experts scoring round after round. At the end of 15 rounds all the scorecards were tabulated. The result was a draw. It was that close.

Norton could have won this fight but instead of fighting all out as a challenger for the heavyweight championship he threw away 2-3 rounds. Prior to the 15th round Norton was told to not take any chances, worst advise from any corner ever, and instead of going all out he laid back and did nothing for 2:40 of that round. Ali won that round and with it the fight.

 

Harold Lederman, who became the official scorer for HBO, was one of the judges.