When do you think Ali should have called it quits?

Please justify this in light of my analysis. Anybody who cares about Ali as a human being, rather than a money making attraction, would not want to see him fight on after Manilla...never mind take all that terrible punishment from Shavers.

Use your imagination...imagine Ali today with much of his health intact: What a character and an asset we would have! Why do you want to see harm done to the shell of a once great fighter, with each blow further scrambling Ali's brains?

I repeat...legacy wise, nothing is gained by Ali after Manilla. Health wise, it is a catastrophe.

 

After I submitted my first post to this thread, I reviewed Ali/Spinks II in it's entirety. Although it was a remarkable display of conditioning and prolonged footwork over the 15 round distance, he no longer had the timing or accuracy of his better earlier wins. I haven't watched Ali/Shavers from beginning to end, but I'm beginning to wonder if Manila was indeed the proper showing with which to end his career.

 

After Manila. And it is pretty certain to say that Ali is now ill cuz of the punches he took in the last few years. He took too many doing that rope-a-dope. A peak Ali didn't need to do that - it worked against Foreman but was a big disadvantage against other fighters like Frazier and Norton.

 

I've always had my reservations about punches taken in adulthood as a causative factor in all such situations. It seems to me that the sparring and competition during an unskilled childhood, when the developing brain is being subjected to repeated blows, may be more responsible in such situations.

The Quarrys, Benitez and Ali all took up boxing before or right at the onset of puberty. Those who made a mature informed decision to take up boxing on their own initiative seem to have fared much better, despite participating in far more sparring and competitive situations.

Archie Moore, Ron Lyle, Ken Norton, Larry Holmes, Marvin Hagler and Emile Griffith didn't seem to have any difficulties in this regard, perhaps because their brains had more fully matured physically before they laced on the gloves. (Willie Pep has been described as having died from complications of pugilistica dementia, but he was also 84 years old, and functional well into his 70s, so I don't necessarily buy pugilistica dementia as a causative factor in his decline. Plenty of that age who never boxed fall victim to the same condition. The difficulties Griffith is having now are due to being mugged by thugs in a back alley.)

Now this is not to say that Ali did not pay a substantial price for the punishment he took later in his career, but that if he'd taken up boxing at 19, instead of 12, he might be in far better condition today. Children with developing brains should not be getting routinely punched in the head, and it often seems that the later somebody takes up boxing, the later in life they can continue a longer career.

 

I'm glad you're reviewing the facts and moving toward the same conclusion I reached.

Ali beat Spinks because Spinks was completely off the rails, non-stop drug fuelled partying, run-ins with the law and had done perhaps just 10 days of training at most. Spinks lost the rematch more than Ali won it.

As for Shavers, it was more Ali the performer than Ali the fighter. He outsmarted rather than outfought Shavers. Ali was clowning for the audience and conning Shavers (who was worried about tiring too early) out of going for the kill. Sure, Ali showed amazing courage and durability...but he had done that dozens of times already.

Shavers was the last time we saw even a glimmer of what Ali once was, and the price paid in punishment was far too high.

Manilla was the last time we saw the real Ali, the magnificent warrior. This was the final get out point...to be honest, it was probably one gruelling fight too many.

 

Duodendum: interesting thoughts on the damage a young boxers brain suffers. Some food for thought there. Thanks for sharing.

It is also the case with Ali that he took a remarkable amount of uneccessary punishment in sparring sessions. (remember, a headguard cannot protect the brain) He would lay on the ropes and let powerful punchers tee off on him round after round. A 22 year old Tim Witherspoon recalled getting in his share of heavy shots to Ali's head (when Ali was training for the Holmes fight) during sparring.

 

Far from a headguard not being able to protect the brain, wearing one might actually undermine the emphasis placed upon actively defending it against punches.

Abe Attell slammed Dempsey's use of headgear in sparring, claiming that wearing one would supplant the effort put into parrying a jab away from the head, resulting in one lazily allowing himself to simply absorb the pop. It's widely believed in some circles, that it's not the impact of a few hard punches that lead to serious head injury, but the accumulative effect of taking many smaller impacts over an extended period of time.

The reasoning behind Attell's criticism of Dempsey's headgear use became apparent in Jack's losing efforts against Tunney. Although Gene only got three or four clean shots at Dempsey in 20 rounds of combat, Jack was wholly dependent on his ability to slip Tunney's jabs, not using his right to defensively parry or redirect the impact of Tunney's relentless stabbing. This is what led to his decision to retire. Dempsey was afraid of losing his eyesight, a risk brought on by his failure to actively parry Tunney's jabs in a proactive fashion.

Against Max Baer, the well-schooled Louis put on a clinic in how to swipe away a jab with a defensively held right. In Jack Blackburn's day, mouthguards and headgear were not used in training, and that was part of the orientation Blackburn used in tutoring Louis (although Joe did use modern protective equipment in training). Defense is a much underrated part of the Bomber's boxing method, and 80% of the right hand's job should be to defend, not attack.

What headgear can actually do is safeguard against cuts, due to a clash of heads particularly. Some designs also protect the nose. But nobody should have the mistaken belief that headgear protects the brain, and ought not to proceed with the assumption that it has any value in this particular respect.

 

More great info, thanks Duo.

I guess the bottom line is that gloves and headgear decrease the risk of superficial injury, cuts, etc, but increase the risk of serious brain injury. A padded head is also a bigger target to hit, and a padded glove allows you to hit harder without such a big risk of hand injury.

By cleaning up the sport, the Marquis of Queensbury made it more dangerous.

 

:good

 

After winning back the title from Leon Spinks.

 

the rubber match with JF

 

Manilla definitely. To retire after winning one of the greatest bouts in HW history would have been a classy way to cap off a fantastic career. The fights he had after that did nothing to enhance his legend.

 

We cant go back and change history. What happen happen.

 

But you can spin and rewrite it.

 

Thrilla in Manila would have been the optimal time. At absolute lastest, I'd say after his fight with Shavers, by virtue of the fact that this was really the last fight where he displayed any of the ability that had made him such a great fighter. If he retires after producing the effort that he gave in the fifteenth and final round, then that, too, would have been an acceptable way to go out.