Muhammad Ali to Lead the parade at Olympic openings

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Originally Posted by THE PHILOSOPHER

His wins over the likes of Liston, Patterson, Chuvalo, Quarry, Bonavena, Frazier, Tirell, Ellis, Mathis, Foster, Foreman, Lyle, Shavers, and Spinks all pretty much much make up for it

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-Patterson was approaching 40 and weighed 188½lbs

-Liston was probably 40 and a heroine addict (was mob ruled and probably threw the 2nd fight, first was close liston quit on stool)

-Chuvalo was nearly 40 by the 2nd fight and was basicaly a journeyman having 18 losses.

-Quarry was a 190lb CW and a never was.

-Bonavena lol

-Frazier 5'10" 205lb crude slugger that would be unable to fight nowadays due to being blind in one eye.

-Terrell, i read recently that terrell was an example of how ali would handle the klitschkos Ernie Terrell was 6'6" and a good boxer but thats were the comparisons end...

Ernie Terrell IS ONE OF THE WEAKEST MOST FEATHERFISTED GUYS ever witnessed in the whole history of real heavyweight boxing.

He scored only 2 KOs (in his entire career) in real heavyweight fights.

1 KO against Garcia (who started at 150+ lbs).
and 1 KO against a 33-16 bum (Bill Drover).

Ernie Terrell is NOTHING compared to the Klitschkos.

Terrell's real heavyweight record (200x2) is 9-5.

Additionally Terrell claims that Ali thumbed him ("Clay as Clay can") so that his eye got jammed and was fixed in one direction since the early rounds.

Terrell's medium weight is 197 lbs. He was a CRUISER. Compare Terrell with modern cruisers not with real heavyweights 50 pounds heavier.

-Foster was a LHW in his mid 30's (WEIGHED 180LBS FOR THE FIGHT)

-Elliss was 185LBS for the ali fight, good win but nothing special considering he lost 12 fights.

-Mathis was a fat blob at nearly 260lbs[/QUOTE]

Sorry fella, you were right all along and the majority of the world were wrong..i forgot ali IQ was 76 it all makes sense now..

He should have fought in vietnam but he was too stupid to realise that..lol

Muppet!

In this age of the Internet, it's easy to sit back and pick old fighters apart for the littlest details... probably just to get a few "ooohs" and "aaahs" from people you're trying to impress with your trivia-gathering skills.

But unless you lived in the age when all this shit was going on, you have no place to criticize like that. You can criticize a man's actions... but you can't possibly know what his motives and circumstances were. There's too many smug, young "know-it-all's" running around showing off what they've read on Wikipedia and/or BoxRec.

To those I would say: "What the fuck do you know about the state of the world when Ali was young and saying all those outrageous things?" Sure, he was a bit insensitive and many times his mouth got him into trouble. But who here has lived in an age when you were refused access to a restaurant, school, or bus because of the color of your skin? If you haven't, then you're not qualified to criticize the guy's motives.

He pissed off many people... that's right. But in his own, trash-talking way, he probably got many, many people talking about the issues that were affecting society in those days. The Vietnam war wasn't a very popular war with many people in the U.S. And Ali decided to take a stand, knowing he would be stripped of his title, and incur the wrath of millions of people. But he did it anyway. And as for his constant barrage of insults at Joe Frazier.... hell..... fighters today say much worse things, and people just laugh it off as part of the game. Can you spell "double standard"?

So true. Go back 40 years and judge ali and tell him to his face that shit about his IQ when you havent even seen the inside of a boxing ring.
Prick.

I know you're mums know who ali is but that's hardly a ringing endorsement is it! My mum knows who the jackson five are but hasn't got a clue who i.e ludovico einaudi or pink floyd are! lol A lot of americans and westerners in general are quite ignorant.

Ali's not the best boxer ever, that would be ray robinson, laszlo papp, stevenson, greb etc! He's not the greatest HW ever either, most of the post 70's boxers would beat him i.e tyson, wlad, lewis, vitali, prime bowe etc

I laugh my arse off when i hear the klit's wouldn't do well in ali's era (which mainly consisted of sub 200lb fighters as i have shown lol) yet the only half decent europeans ali fought (the wall well and truly still up!) were 185lb henry cooper RIP (who today would be a cruiserweight journeyman) should by rights have a brutal KO win over PRIME cassius, And B level HW and featherfist joe bugner (who was notorious for not even trying in a fight and who was just in the ring to make a living) who laughably and quite easily went the distance with both men (the frazier fight was very close in fact!) and ali was hospitalised after the his bugner fight!! Bugner was swimming in the hotel pool straight after lol

Neither cooper or bugner are remotely close to the level of the superheavyweights of recent years....Hell even 195lb southpaw karl milenberger frustrated the hell out of ali and ali has since said karl was his trickiest EVER fight! What does that tell you in this age of southpaws and european champions?

Im sorry to shatter your illusions on the crappyness of that era and the 180lb AMERICAN fighters ali was lining up to humiliate, yes there were some great fights, buts thats because most of them were limited fighters who didn't know how to keep each other at bay like i.e kllitschkos do....

And the statement of 'He's the greatest of all time!' nonsense, how do you measure such a thing? Sports go back millennia after millennia, how do you know there has not been greater sportsmen than ali?

In terms of what they achieved in there respective sports there were many ppl even over the last century who far surpass what ali did in his, far surpass!! Iv named many already, Just because you and your mums are ignorant to them or TV doesn't show them doesn't mean they were no good!

Jesse owens is the greatest BLACK sportsmen ever anyway if we are to judge them the way we do ali!

Ali is a product of the first media age, only the west really knew who ali was (america being the epi centre of the TV age) because of the advent of TV and there being only 4 channels lol America and the west were dominated by its media, If he were around today with the multiple media formats in a more global age he would not be as notorious/infamous, He'd be just another american gobshite....

PHILOSOPHER you are unreal, for a person that knows boxing, your bias towards Ali for his out of ring activties have clouded you judgement of the great fighter that he was. if Chris Byrd had done half the think Ali did, you would be all over here claiming he was the best heavyweight ever. :)

Its not all about weight..ali was one the fastest heavyweights ever and so was tyson.
Tyson weighed less than most of his opponents. Its all about skill, accuracy and stamina..Ali had that in bundles.
Its always interesting to hear negative view about ali but your argument is shot down in flames when you compare vitalis record and greatest loss against a fat out of prime lewis.

Come ere son, let me give you a hug.

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Originally Posted by THE PHILOSOPHER

I know you're mums know who ali is but that's hardly a ringing endorsement is it! My mum knows who the jackson five are but hasn't got a clue who i.e ludovico einaudi or pink floyd are! lol A lot of americans and westerners in general are ignorant.

He'd be just another american gobshite....

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That was my whole point, dickhead. My mums not a Westerner. She's from a poor village in Cyprus and knew of Ali which is unheard of for any other sports star, especially in that day and age. Ali's starpower was massive. He effected everyone.

Where are you from? I'm guessing from that last sentence that you're one of us Brits who couldn't give a "Yank" credit even if he saved you from a burning building. Lose the blinkers and you might see the greatness in Ali.

Maybe there were other sportsman who achieved more than Ali but again, they didn't receive the coverage by your own admission so stop clutching at straws. Claiming people are ignorant and that's why they know of Ali? Lol..bullshit. Even if that we true, it doesn't matter. He's still arguably the greatest sportsman to have ever lived even if by virtue of "ignorance"

*Ali made racial remark after racial remark... that's not the olympics.

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Originally Posted by bigstinkybug

*Ali made racial remark after racial remark... that's not the olympics.

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Ali has said a lot of things in his life and he has certainly apologised for most of the contradictions in his life. Ali was an Olympian so has more right to lead the parade than Beckham.