You Tube Gold: Boxers Remember Ali

Muhammad Ali had an extraordinary effect on people. He showed immense personal courage during the Vietnam War and was willing to sacrifice everything to hold his principles. This inspired many and at the same time infuriated many.

When he returned to boxing, he may have lost a bit of quickness but none of his courage nor his ability to infuriate people.

Take George Foreman and Joe Frazier. He made his legendary matches with them highly personal, insulting their looks and their intelligence. Frazier in particular was enraged and after one of their fights, Ali said it was the closest he had ever come to dying.

As a young man Foreman didn’t particularly like him either and after Ali’s shocking win over the young champion, didn’t handle it very well.

Yet in this video, both men, particularly Frazier, speak emotionally of their old rival

Given their bitterness when they were both still boxing, Frazier’s comments on Ali are touching.

Sadly, this video, perhaps unintentionally, underscores the damage that the sport does to boxers. Foreman was out of the game early before his later-in-life comeback and still seems alert and healthy today, but Frazier seems to clearly have slowed down here and of course Ali lost his physical abilities, including his ability to speak, as Parkinson’s ravaged his body.

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