“Do you know how to fight?”
It all starts in with a stolen bike Louisville. Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr., which is Ali’s birth name, depicts the theft from Officer JOh Martin on. “I will kill the thief”, he sounds teenager. Martin, who also runs a boxing school, replies: “Do you know how to fight?” Clay don’t know, but he’s a fast learner. And he’s fast. With feet, hands, upper body – and mouth.
“I will one day be the greatest of all time”, he announces as a 40-kilo linnet after the first amateur fight. His Olympic gold medal in Rome in 1960 paved his way to professional boxing, where he caused a sensation with his unconventional style. The dancing in the ring, the full-bodied predictions of the knockout-rounds, the crude insults- Clay is different. and Clay is better.
“Will turn the world upside down”
In February 1964 he comes across Sonny Liston from the WM-Throne. “I will turn the world upside down”, says the new one champion. He now publicly stands by his Muslim faith, which he previously practiced in the mosques of the questionable Nation of Islam practiced secretly. He lays the “slave name” Cassius Clay and wants to be called Muhammad Ali from now on. challenger Ernie Terell refuses – and receives a barbaric beating for it. “What’s My Name?!”, Ali yells at him after every hail of blows.
Young black people worship him as an idol, others are afraid of Ali. His stance on the smoldering racial conflict USA radicalizes. When he refuses to go to war in Vietnam, Ali is finally a villain for many. He received a five-year prison sentence for refusing military service, which was only lifted later. When he returns to the boxing ring, he is different fighters. Ali no longer dances.
Learned from defeats
In the title fight against Joe Frazier in March 1971 Ali conceded his first defeat, a little later against Ken Norton a second. A “punishment from God” for his sins, says the notoriously unfaithful Ali. He’s refocusing on the sport, winning the rematches against Norton and Frazier and turns in October 1974 George Foreman.
In the “Rumble in the Jungle” in Zaire, Ali tricked the favorite with a counter tactic while the Africans were cheering (“Ali, bomaye” – Ali, kill him). In the USA, too, he was suddenly met with a lot of sympathy, US President Gerald Ford praises the once outlaw as “Man of Principles”.
missed resignation
It’s the perfect time to resign. But Ali, who attracts windy promoters like Don King, doesn’t stop there. In the “Thrill in Manila” he quarrels with his archenemy Frazier a brutal ring battle. After that, Ali is just a shadow of himself. He mumbles more and more, the trembling increases. mother Odessa Clay begs: “I don’t want to see him fight anymore.” But Ali can’t help it.
He retaliates, though Leon Spinks and becomes world champion for the third time, but miserable losses against follow Larry Holmes and Trevor Berbick. After that, Ali also knows: “Time has caught up with me.”
After his resignation, the doctors diagnosed him with Parkinson’s disease. He becomes humble and shows himself forgiving. He finally won people’s hearts at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, when he lit the fire with trembling hands and revealed his fragility to three billion spectators. Twenty years later, Ali dies – but his myth lives on.
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Status: 16.01.2022, 23:00