He may well have been, but don’t let the Ali fans hear you say that. :)
I’m not a big boxing fan. Couldn’t tell you who was great and who wasn’t. But I’m sure it’s like football, namely that at any given TIME for any given TEAM you can make the argument that they were the “best ever,” ie. the ‘86 Bears or the Patsies or perhaps even the Aikman/Irvin/Smith Cowboy teams. The measure, of course, is over time. Ali and Louis certainly withstood that test.