When did they start using the wicked intros with jazz/ rock/ hard rock music to summarize both fighters' careers in the "Look Back" s that were prevalent from the mid 70s on? The earliest one I know of is the intro for the Ali-Lyle fight. When did they start doing that? Surely it wasn't the first one?
ABC Wide World of Sports started doing that in the late 1960s. Not necessarily with the rock music etc but they would often show highlights of previous fights and recap their careers and personalities along with interviews etc.
Hmmm... very interesting. I couldn't picture them doing those when they had black and white. I always liked it when they did those in the 70s and 80s.
I believe Howard Cosell was behind it. I remember reading in one of his books that he said he filmed a profile of Ali walking the streets of London and meeting British fans before his title defense against Henry Cooper in 1966. ABC was going to start the fight without the profile. During a commercial break, Cosell ran back to Ali's dressing room and asked him not to come into the ring for like 10 minutes or so, and hold up the fight, until ABC played the prefight segment he filmed. And Ali complied. Waited in his dressing room. Said they couldn't rush the champ. ABC ran the profile and a couple more commercials. Then Ali entered. It was considered a new form of sports journalism on television at the time. Newspapers had been doing it for a few years, with writers like Jimmy Breslin and Pete Hamill. Mike Wallace was doing it on television with political stories and entertainment figures. It was rare for sports television, however. Howard called it "getting up close and personal." Then they became a regular thing, more or less, after that. For example, I have copies of Ali-Folley in 1967 and Liston-Clark and Ellis-Quarry in 1968 with prefight profiles/interviews. Now, it seems weird if there isn't a prefight profile or hype segment before major bout.
