Inspirational Ali

Muhammad Ali was a force of nature and like nature could he not be repressed or controlled. He was a perfectly structured fighting machine that came in the most humane form possible for a sport such as boxing.

Where others in profession evoked fear through their feral countenances he inspired admiration bordering on deification. He could land jabs and dance like a butterfly with equal facility and could hold an audience spellbound with his wit and repartee. George Bush Jr had once conceded, “When you say the greatest of them all is in the room, everyone knows who that is”.

Muhammad Ali was born Cassius Clay in a working class household in Kentucky and as a 12-year-old was introduced to boxing by a local police officer. He turned pro at the age of 18 and as a 22-year-old challenged Sony Liston, the reigning World Heavyweight champion – considered invincible then.

Nobody gave any chance to Cassius Clay he was dismissed as a bantamweight with 200 lbs of body weight by sports journalists of the time. The odds of seven to one 1 were arrayed against his win by the likes of Lester Bromberg of the New York World Telegram who predicted that “it would last longer than the Floyd Patterson fight, a full one round at least”. It was obvious that a young and brash Ali given to verbal sparring and braggadocio was not liked by biased and racist journalists.

Come February 25, 1964 and the world lay stunned when after six rounds a battered and tired Sonny Liston failed to stand up for the seventh round. A star had risen on the boxing firmament. Ali subsequently embraced Islam as it was the only creed that appealed to his iconoclastic temperament.

As a 25-year-old he refused to get drafted for Vietnam uttering his famous soliloquy, “They never called me nigger, they never lynched me, they didn’t put no dogs on me, they didn’t rob me of my nationality, rape and kill my mother and father. Shoot them for what? How can I shoot them poor people?” He was stripped of his boxing title and passport and banned from professional fights for well over three and a half years. He claimed the status of conscientious objector against the draft and the US Supreme Court overturned the earlier court conviction.

A jaded Muhammad Ali was defeated by the Joe Frazier in 1971; yet he returned to claim his heavyweight title in 1974 against one of the most fearsome boxing opponents of all times – George Foreman. Ali invented a new style of boxing called ‘Rope a Dope’ when he parried the relentless charge of Foreman by leaning against the ropes and absorbing the blow of his punches through the ropes. This was classic asymmetric warfare that was studied later for conceptual novelty by warfare scholars like Arreguin Toft and T V Paul.

It was a treat to watch Ali taunt Foreman in whispers while leaning against the ropes with hands covering his head; “George I’m disappointed, George you are not hitting me”. A furious George Foreman kept jabbing with maddening ferocity and wasted his energy. Ali soon rallied back and unleashed a flurry of left-right combos.

After winning ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ at Kinshasa Ali returned to take on Joe Frazier in 1975’s ‘Thrilla in Manilla’. Ali chided Joe Frazier before the fight, “It will be a killa and a thrilla and a chilla when I get the Gorilla in Manila”. Ali got a scare in the sixth round when a walloping left hook from Frazier rattled him. A dazed and groggy Ali rallied on doggedly and with his nimble footwork and lightening punches kept Frazier at bay. When Frazier conceded after the fourteenth round it was remembered by Ali as a fight that was the closest thing to death.

In Pakistan the fight was watched live via satellite by dreamy-eyed boxing enthusiasts like us and others who in Ali’s win drew vicarious pleasure. Ali was all that a young imagination could relate to – courage, hope and passion.

Ali’s reclamation of his title after defeating Leon Spinks betokened a ‘never say die’ spirit that appealed to the youth for whom he emblazoned a trail of hope. Ali was a fighter par excellence who made boxing beautiful, raising it to almost an art form. He defied conventions both inside as outside the ring as a conscientious objector, a civil rights activist, and a philanthropist. The best encomium on his death was paid by one of his dearest rivals George Foreman, “the God has come to claim his champion”.

The writer is a PhD scholar at Nust.

Email: rwjanj@hotmail.com