Not a fan of his politics. He was a man of his time. Jim Crow laws are gone now. They weren’t then. He was influenced by Islamics and Marxists who convinced him that was how to get even. Some poor choices
But.... The best heavyweight boxer of all time. A smart fighter. Those 14-15 rounds of punishment for 3 fights against Frazer....how does anyone survive that. And the massive abuse he took fighting Forman....biding his time taking the abuse to his arms till he tired out old George...then coming in for the kill. The Zaire fight was incredible. Watched it the day after in a movie theatre.
You either loved or hated his schtick. He stole his bombastic rhetoric from Gorgeous George the wrestler. My dad hated it and him, even before the Vietnam thing. Called him Gaseous Clay. Dad loved Marciano. He has been the heavyweight champ and he was Italian. Marciano was a slugger, not’ boxer’, per se. Don’t know how that computer generated fight would have gone in real life if both men fought each other in their prime. I would have put money on Ali though.
He got his brain scrambled by way to many punches to his head. And he paid for it in his last 25 or so years. Should have quit sooner.
Anyway RIP Cassius/Ali. You gave me hours of entertainment.
He did NOT survive those fights, at least in any meaningful way. I represented Howard Cosell on a number of matters and I remember him getting very angry anytime some othet sportscaster said Muhammad Ali had Parkinson’s disease.
Howard would look at the screen and muther, “ It’s not Parkinson’s disease, you idiot, it’s Parkinson’s-like symptoms, caused by the huge number of hard blows he took to the Head. In any other fighter we would simply call him punch drunk. But for Ali, we always we have to pretend it’s not.!!”
Howard was very angry and very sad for what his friend had become, both in his religion and his health