Ali

There was a time I hated Muhammad Ali. I can remember watching him fight Ken Norton on ABC’s Wide World of Sports March of ’73 in San Diego. I can vividly remember Norton throwing punches and Ali trying to counter. I was 9 at the time, and lived for sports. Ali was larger than life, and I wanted him to lose. I can’t remember why, other than I always seemed to root for the underdog. When he fought George Foreman a year later I thought, well….he’ll finally get “his”. Of course, Ali had the last laugh.

As I grew older, I loved Muhammad Ali. I spent the better part of 10 years working in and around boxing. I like to say it’s where I received my “MBA”. What I learned from the characters and charlatans, thieves and gamblers, magicians and masters, was how to survive. If there was one memory that I will always carry, it was the time I met Ali. I was standing in line with the late Jay Edson at the Caesars Palace coffee shop in Las Vegas waiting for a table when “the champ” walked in. Edson was a boxing character. He was a referee for many years. Worked for Top Rank Boxing at the time, and was a man who could make anything happen. Needed tickets? Ask Jay. Have a problem, Jay will fix it. Need some money? Here ya go. When I first met him at a bar in Vegas I was 23. He was a burly man, strong as an ox, and could scare you to death, but he had that glint in his eye and a big white smile that put you at ease. When he looked at me that first night and said “Son, if you need anything while your here, and I mean anything….you ask me, got it?”. I got it. So when Ali walked in to the coffee shop and the mob descended on him, I asked. “Jay,” i said…..“I want to me The Champ”.

Edson had known Ali for years. So when he sat down, we walked over. Ali, looked up, twinkle in his eye, smile on his face, stared at Jay for a minute. I froze. At 24, I had met a lot of famous people already. Presidents, movie starts, business legends, and even a queen. I could not move. Ali seemed giant. His aura was like a force field that moved out well beyond his body. He was electric. He was handsome. He was brilliant and funny, and gentle. We sat with Ali for an hour. I never said a word. I couldn’t. This was the most famous man in the world. I always wished I had another shot at the man. There was so much to ask him. That chance never came again.

Muhammad Ali died last night at 74. He wasn’t the Ali of my youth, but, even as Parkinson’s took his body, his speech, and his movement, it didn’t take his spirit. I watched him on TV years ago light the Olympic Torch. Shaking, struggling as he climbed the stairs, willing himself to a physical feat that was probably as tough as taking a Frazier hook. He won that battle. I watched him a few years ago at a charity event do magic tricks and take pictures with people. That mischievous twinkle was still in his eye.

Ali was the most unique man of our generation. Complex and compelling. He was a showman. He was more articulate than any professor or politician I ever heard. A rapper before anyone knew what rap was. An artist and actor. And he was the best pure heavyweight boxer there ever was.

The lore of Ali, real or imagined, was legendary. One such tale I was told by the late great boxing press agent Irving Rudd still lingers. The story goes, that when Ali was cleared to return to boxing following his banishment following his Vietnam War stance which helped define Ali the man, he visited with Madison Square Garden matchmaker Teddy Brenner. Brenner a tough and brilliant man, was a fierce negotiator. Ali walks in and Brenner offers him $100,000 to make his return bout at the Garden. He says, “Ali, you’re not that well known anymore, and you’ll need to build yourself up again…”. Ali scoffs. He says to Brenner, “How ‘bout we walk outside and if I we can make it one block without getting mobbed, I’ll fight for your money. But if we don’t make it a block, you pay me $1 million.” Brenner agrees. So the pair walk out onto 30th street and they can’t even make it to the corner before they are surrounded. True or not, the story is legend!

His antics sometimes took away from how great a fighter he actually was. In 1995, I was sitting with George Foreman and the late great sportswriter Jim Murray at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills. Foreman had been outsmarted by Ali in the jungles of Zaire 20+ years earlier. We talked about that fight. Big George shook his head all those years later as he recounted how Ali had not only won the physical fight, but had mentally beaten him before the fight even started. He was firm though in his praise, “Make no mistake about it. I hit him with punches that would have broken concrete,” he said as he balled up a fist as big as a catchers mitt. “He stood there, against the ropes, taking punches and laughing at me. I couldn’t believe it. And then, he hit me hard and I couldn’t get up. Don’t ever think that Muhammad wasn’t the greatest. He was the master”.

Ali was many other things too. He could be cruel. He hurled vicious insults at Joe Frazier and Ernie Terrell. He tortured Floyd Patterson in their fight. He belittled men, and didn’t treat women well at times.

He was human.

He was also the closest thing I’ve ever seen to something larger than life.

If there is a heaven, than Ali is likely sitting at the head of the table telling stories and doing magic tricks right now. He’s also probably looking for Joe Frazier to say sorry. As he grew older, he recognized his flaws and did all he could to make things better for people the world over. At least that’s how the story is now told.

With kids of my own now not old enough to really know who Ali the man was, there is YouTube. They can watch the fights, but I’m telling them to watch his interviews. He stood for something. He had beliefs. He was a dreamer. He dreamed impossible things. One of my favorite quotes in life is one he said many years ago;

“Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”

The world will likely never see the likes of Muhammad Ali or Cassius Clay again. He was an original. He will live on thankfully on the web and in film and on television. His lessons of courage and conviction are things for all of us to think about and live with. RIP Champ.