If Ali had kept his mouth shut and been gracious to Frazier in Manila …

He made up for it by having 3 legs…

 

GREAT post!! I always thought Ali crossed a line with Joe--and that certainly added to Frazier's "intensity" whenever they faced each other in the ring. But as the above post points out-Frazier was a hard, tough dude regardless of who the opponent was and he meant business!! (Look at how he grew up--it was as poverty stricken an upbringing as you can possibly imagine!! That HAD to toughen him up considerably!!)

 

Compared to Frazier's upbringing Ali grew up in veritable luxury--and that probably in itself would have fueled some resentment. A very good point!!

 

I don't think that it woudl have made any difference.

Frazier had not come to Manilla to lose.

 

Muhammad and Joe would still have thrown the kitchen sink at each other even if they'd been best buddies.

 

Whats ATG mean?

 

I’ve seen Izenberg’s telling. “I don’t want to hear it,” he recalls Frazier saying if Ali’s hard luck story about his bike, & mentions the hardship of manual labour as a pre-teen worker.

 

That Ali was watching a Frazier fight (Bugner?) some time after Zaire, & said Frazier looked irresistibly beatable. The big name without the risk it normally implies.

 

All time great.

 

Most forget Ali had a relatively stable upbringing. Especially considering his adolescent/ pre teen yrs were during the late forties early fifties. When Jim Crow / segregation was the law of the country esp the south.
Both of Ali's parents were in the home, and by any account I've read were supportive and loving.
Frazier though , saw the south of Jim Crow, Segregation, share cropping , and Racial terror.
Joe Frazier was in the fields from sun up to sun down his adolescent/ pre teen yrs.
Frazier didn't have the family support of Ali.
Joe Frazier's fire was created from that upbringing.
So even if Ali was always cordial with Frazier, but the same with everyone else. Frazier more than likely would still dislike him because of his fame, and popularity.
Yes, I know Frazier gave Ali money when things weren't going well for him. But a lot of black sports stars / entertainers as well as white people supported Ali during time. So was Frazier doing it because he liked him, or because he internally agreed with his political stance, and was Ali doing what he may have wanted to do?

 

A lot of fighters will use anything they can to fire themselves up.

Someone could be fighting Marvin Hagler for the middleweight title and brought him a Hall of Fame plaque and say he’s the greatest of all time, the smartest, the best looking … and Marvin would find something about it to take as an insult: ‘He had the audacity to look me in the eye when he handed me that plaque.’

Joe wasn’t going to go into a fight with Ali with anything but venom in his heart. He wanted to beat the man because he wanted to BE the man.

 

They are, but neither was prime when they lost to Ali.

 

You're the only idiot here. Neither was prime vs Ali.