Why did Ali slug with Frazier in FOTC?

I don't think at that age, he had the legs to use the ring that much.

I think Frazier would've given Ali problems and a pretty tough fight at any stage in his career, anyway.

 

That age?? Ali was only 28. He was no old man.

 

He wasn't old, but old enough and inactive from the sport enough where his legs weren't quite the same.

 

I'd say it was most likely the rust of the lay-off, though it wouldn't surprise me a bit to find out that he was determined to make the point that he could stand in their with Joe.

 

Ali somtimes won fights by abandoning boxing and slugging.

I would cite the Lyle fight as an example.

If your hands are that fast you dont need to hit hard to unload all hell on an opponent.

 

I didn't think it was really close either. Frazier beat him up and won by a clear margin.

A lot of EFFECTIVE aggression.

 

I was a kid when it happened, but I remember the hype. Went to see it on close-circuit TV at an outside venue and not only froze my bony ass off, but could barely make out the fuzzy silhouettes of two hulking figures tearing at each other. 'Course I've seen it since a few times. Often fights don't live up to their hype, and other times a great fight comes out of nowhere, but this was one that was just what it was supposed to be: a war from start to finish.

 

He noticed that Frazier was weak during the early going and hit Frazier with everything he had during the first 5 rounds.

A great observation, as Frazier's ultimate downfall happened exactly as Ali planned to execute it. However, Ali's problem was that he lacked the punching power necessary to bring the plan to success. He won those rounds, but lost the fight.

 

It wasn't really much of a choice, Frazier made the fight and more or less forced him to.

 

It also struck me, not so much in this fight, or in the other two Frazier fights, because Joe was just too good, but in Ali's later fights, I guess most notably the one with Foreman, when your hands are that fast you don't even have to move your feet.

 

Ali didn't have the legs to dance for 3 minutes a round anymore. Combined with the type of style Frazier possesed and Ali was in for a long night. Joe made Ali stand and fight. He just wouldn't give him any breathing room or let him rest at any point in the fight. If Ali had his old (or young) legs then he would've danced all night and kept Joe at arms length (or tried to anyway) but this version of Ali couldn't do that which is why it was such a tough night for him. No matter what version of Ali showed up that night however, that version of Joe would have given Ali a rough go of it.

 

Relentless, that ****in' Joe Frazier. Half well-oiled machine, the other half 100% heart. Inspiring, as beautiful and pure as an opera or a soaring eagle, as primal as laughter or tears. Boxing's simple, but deep, I think that's why people love it. It's accesible, but it will take you as far as you are willing to go. Boxers are poets, railing against the world, outsiders, subjects of ridicule or hero worship depending on the showing their last time out, but those two guys, Joe Frazier and Muhummad Ali, in 1970's America, a hundred years after slavery, right in the middle of the beginning of a penance, of a coming of age? The hip guy from Philly, the traditionalist, not unaware of the hurts of the past but with no grudge at the moment, just happy to be there. The other boy a southern boy, too gifted for his own good, half again smarter than he was meant to be and that much more rebellious, if that wasn't a slice of Americana I've never seen one.