Was the Rumble in the Jungle fixed?

It’s a fight it’s not disingenuous to bring up a fight.

 

He said all the equivalent stuff about Frazier before the FotC, too. It’s just Ali being Ali. In the Frazier case, I genuinely think he believed Frazier wasn’t that good. Liston & Foreman I think he was scared of.

Ali would talk tough taking on God if that were his opponent. He’s good enough to win most fights, so he got most results. I don’t think he got into Liston or Foreman’s head at all prior to the actual fight, & I know he didn’t with Frazier (or at least, not to any effect except to hurt himself).

 

Its disingenuous if you are to use it as an example of his lack of stamina. Anybody in a brawl is bound to get tired quickly.

 

Foreman was brutally overconfident, he blasted out Frazier in 2 and Norton in 1, fighters who had beaten Ali and George bragged that he was going to do the same to Ali and at the time that was a widely held opinion, no more than a couple of rounds. After unloading everything he had on Ali putting virtually all his power on every punch Foreman had an , uh oh moment. Ali's was still there and mocking him to boot.
I thought the die was cast after the 5th,

 

The fight wasn't an "outlier". Foreman hit Ali with enough bombs to stop the massive majority of top heavyweights. He just couldn't hurt him. Even above the reasonably sustained punishment he dished out Foreman just couldn't put him in trouble and set up an opening for a finish....at all. Some of the stuff he hit Ali with put others on ***** street and paved the path to victory but Ali stood tall and gave him NOTHING to work with on that front.

 

I agree.

I'll never forget seeing the pre-fight interviews and hype. Ali wasn't just dismissive of his opponent, not in the way he was Frazier. He seemed absolutely INSULTED that anyone would believe George could beat him.

I think Ali might have been a master at...let's say creating a certain persona. Holmes said he was driving around with him once when Ali started reciting, out of nowhere "I am the Greatest, no one is prettier. I float like a butterfly..." (Holmes was astonished lol).

 

Good points old mate. Ali's confidence and self belief was second to none. Ali could push himself to places not many people ever get to.

 

I decided to watch this one start to finish last night. Been a long time. I have to say I don’t really see it. Ali did an immense job of smothering & negating Foreman’s power. Foreman looked almost entirely ineffectual to my eyes. Especially from round two on.

 

I always thought it was a little bit fishy:

1. Foreman's story about Saddler being an inside-man (putting something in his water) might be legit because when he (Foreman) asked Ali for a rematch, Ali said he would only give him one of he re-hired Saddler. Water is tasteless so it would be easy to know if it's tainted.

2. The ropes were conspicuously loose. That played a big in Ali being able absorb Foreman's blows.

3. Foreman seemed to get up at the count of 8/9, his legs weren't all that wobbly but the ref stopped the fight. Foreman didn't really look like he wanted to go on anyway.

Not saying that Ali is guilty of all three counts but I think he must have been responsible for at least one of these occurrences. I don't think they're all a coincidence.

 

Doesn’t help that this was neither the first nor last controversy around an Ali result, either.

 

I always remember an Ali quote, spoken just prior to the Foreman, that always struck me.

It was somewhat paradoxical but it also rang so true.

Ali basically said that pundits might be shocked to see him beat Foreman but they’d be even more shocked to see George put Ali down for the count.

He was so right. People might’ve impartially and rationally calculated for Ali’s demise against Foreman but, at the same time, they might’ve found it very difficult to imagine anyone ever doing that to Ali - despite they, themselves, forecasting a KO of Ali by Foreman.

Ali very much had that Superman aura about him even when you couldn’t necessarily reason a victory for him.

Two miracle victories, 10 years apart, there would’ve been a lot of people not willing to bet against Ali ever again, no matter what.

Years later, that supernatural quality still hung tough, having some believe that Ali could turn yet another miracle against Holmes - despite all
conventional wisdom suggesting otherwise.

I was just a kid when the Holmes fight went down but even I felt that Ali wasn’t going to get it done.

Ali already looked well past it in the two Spinks fights 2 years prior and was inactive since the rematch.

As fans, there was still at least the smaller miracle that we were spared the incomprehensible vision of Ali flat on his back, being counted out - but seeing Ali get beat up was still a very hard watch.

 

Fixed??

Ali and Foreman didnt need to fix bouts.

 

Who is doing that?

 

Foreman during his comeback in the 1980’s was a guest on the N.Y. based Art Rust radio show. He stated all his talk of being drugged, fast count, loose ropes were just excuses. The truth was that “Ali was a big heavyweight and their was just so many of his right hands I could take”.

The ref for this fight, Zach Clayton, stated the ring was the smallest he ever saw. “Like a postage stamp”. He claimed it was a 16 foot ring.

For some reason the ring ropes were for a larger ring hence the inability to tighten them enough to not sag.

Foreman was indeed counted out. The confusion was caused by the closed circuit commentators at ringside. The crowd noise caused them to miss call the count. They were two counts behind the actual count so it looks as if the ref called the fight even thought Foreman had arisen at the count of eight. In actuality Foreman did not beat the count on ten.

Also the count was timed twice on Wide World of Sports a few weeks later. It was a ten second count so Foreman’s claim of a fast count was also erroneous.

 

The ropes didn’t fit the ring & were loose, “for some reason.”