First time I watched this fight and I did not realise how close Ali was to getting beat.

Bonavena was very crude and basic with his punches but it seemed to work as Ali could not get out of the way of his shots and got nailed many times in the fight.

Also I noted a few things about the finnish in the 15th round.The left hook that Ali put him down with has got to be one of the best single punches he ever threw.
After the first knockdown the ref lost control of the fight as not once did Ali go to a nutral corner after putting Oscar down.He was hovering close by waiting to finnish the fight.Bit like Dempsy-Willard.

And last but not least,it was a great finnish by Ali who once he had his man hurt did not let him off the hook.

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Watched it not too long ago myself and i actually stopped the dvd and rewatched the left hook 6 or 7 times before watching it several times in real time. What a peach of a punch! He was one tough cookie. Ended up being shot dead in a brothel a few years later. If you watch it again you'll notice he has Ringo down the side of his shorts, referring to his likeness to ringo starr outta the beatles. He looked no more like ringo starr than i look like robert redford

Bonavena was close to winning until he got KTFO


Actually a real tough guy
Gave Frazier hell twice

I never really thought Bonavena was close to winning in that fight personally but hey if you wanna see a fight were many people thought Ali lost was against Doug Jones early in his career. There was a bit of an outrage being the scoring was so biased for Ali because he was a gold medalist.I have it somewhere in my VHS collection. There are a few others I thought he could have lost.
Frazier II
Norton III
Shavers
I thought Ron Lyle was beating him until the stoppage

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Bonavena was no bum and very nearly knocked out Joe Frazier in the first round, Frazier going down twice and was very shaky. Ali probably should have fought someone a little easier than Bonavena considering he fought Frazier less than 3 months later!

I think in Ali's fight with Billy Daniels, Ali was getting tore up before Daniels got cut and they stopped the fight.

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Let's not get a-head of ourselves David

That's no way to get a-head in life

Now is not the time to lose one's head


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So if Ali had so many close calls and less than impressive performances should he be rated so highly?

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Formerly Snakey, lost a name bet
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Good point Snakey, makes you think.

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I mean being a champion you have to be able to deal with adversity, I think Ali dealt with it pretty well.....he's still #3 for me

Thats what i've always said, of course he deserves praise for taking on the best and showing courage and ETC. But as i've always said to those people, had he lost his fights against Ken Norton x2, Jimmy Young, Earnie Shavers, Doug Jones.

Would he still be seen in the same light ? because i for certain think he lost to Ken Norton x2, Jimmy Young, Earnie Shavers, i thought his fight with Doug Jones was a draw, and in that fight he wasn't that far from his prime either.

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Which means for normal posters he should be number 1.

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Do not let success go to your head and do not let faliure get to your heart.

Close to winning? He looked terrible and i had ali winning every round. This guy looked really awkward against ali.

+1318

...you have no regard for my rating system

Lyle, you have a top ten list somewhere?

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I have to go with the original Sugar as the best, Sugar Ray Robinson.

Actually I have Ali and Joe Louis tied for #1. For those who wonder why Louis when he had problems with 169 pound Conn, well they didn't breed these steroid wooly mammoths over in Europe like Valuev back in the 1930s. Conn moving up to heavyweight would be like say uh, Haye moving up to heavyweight from cruiserweight now.