Why was Muhammad Ali so mean to Joe Frazier?

He stood over his opponents with his arms aloft, looking down on them, sometimes refusing to go to the corner. Not just Liston .... Bonavena comes to mind, Folley too.
Maybe not taunting, but gloating perhaps.

 

Frazier`s take on this was that Ali wasn`t a true lover of all his brothers, but his Muslim brothers only. Frazier said that Ali was only into the ones choosing islam. Where as Frazier`s religion says that all are loved as equals. As much as I love Ali, he was downright cruel with Frazier. Even though it would be gracious for Frazier to forgive him, I understand why he doesn`t...

 

Cleveland Williams, and lets not forget his winding his arm up against a defenseless Richard Dunn...

 

Hard to believe that Bryant Gumbel was quotes as saying `Is Joe Frazier ` white champ in black skin ` ? Joe Frazier came from a humble,very hard background. And was a tough and proud man. Who tried his best to do right by his family and his boxing fans...

 

Yep. That's got to be classed as taunting !

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykub6DUDYME[/ame]

4:39

 

Many fighters,before and after Ali have done that.

 

Yes, I'm sure you can name some.

burt mentioned he never saw Joe Louis, Ray Robinson and Alexis Arguello taunting ..... did they ever do that ?

 

Perhaps it was because he didn't like black people calling him Clay, he was generally ok with white people doing this of course (Angelo Dundee, Cooper, London).

 

Part of his in ring demeanour, and it worked. He succeeded at getting many a great fighter riled out of himself, and took them apart when they got reckless.

Not very classy? Sure.

Damn effective? Undeniably.

 

"I'm so mean I make medicine sick" ...... that might explain it too !

 

Not a nice thing to say that, and Boxing Illustrated ran with it as their cover story.

 

Nit-picking. Many many fighters have done the same. And if you cant see that the Dunne arm-swinging was playing to the crowd then i just dont know. Would you say Hopkins press-ups was taunting Pascal or playing to the crowd?

As for the folley arm-raising. Do you genuinely think of that as taunting? I know he had a lot of respect for Zora, making it his business to go to his son after the fight and tell him how great his father was.

Honestly, and with respect, not just to you but others too, i think no matter whats gets said on these forums some people just dont like Ali and nothing will ever change their minds. And thats cool, we need a diversity in opinions, but where one sees celebrating, others see gloating. Where one sees a great performance, another will see over-the-hill opponent. Where one sees a victory in a close fight, another cries robbery.

 

I'm not nit-picking, I was just trying to help with your question. Maybe burt has a better answer.

:conf

Richard Dunn was dazed and beaten up and the fight was stopped, so Ali's playing to the crowd can certainly be construed as taunting or unnecessary intimidation.

Pascal wasn't in a helpless state, beaten up and knocked out.
Ali's routine against Dunn was funny, IMO, but could certainly be seen as "let me hit him one more time" type gesture.

We all know Ali did taunt some opponents anyway. So it's nothing worth arguing about.

 

No, I already said I don't think it's quite taunting, but it IS gloating over a fallen opponent. (Not just the arm raising, the standing over and looking down at the fallen man)
It's an unnecessary statement of superiority and underlines the subjugation of the opponent. I have no problem with it. I'm just saying.

I have no problem with his celebrating/gloating.
I'm just giving my interpretation on what I see.

 

What he did with Frazier went way beyong taunting,and was not about hyping the fight.