RIP Joe Frazier

So true. Frazier said many times that he turned Ali into the mess he is today.

The shame of it all, since they used their youths to destroy their quality of life later in life, is that Frazier got a fraction of the money for some of those fights that Ali did and ended up living out his life humbly in North Philly, while Ali sold his image for millions.

Frazier won the fight of the century, the first fight, giving Ali his first loss. Ali won the second, but a lot of people thought that he had just danced his way away from Frazier's left hook, and clinched and held a lot, and that Frazier deserved the decision. The Thrilla in Manilla is one of my most vivid early memories. If Frazier's corner hadn't thrown in the towel before the 15th round, there was no way Ali would have been able to get up and fight. He collapsed and had to be carried out of the ring. Regardless of the outcome, that fight was a draw -- two guys who had beat the hell out of each other and were exhausted (blind in one eye in the case of Frazier, unable to stand in the case of Ali).

The way I see it, those two were equals against each other.

I do think the he way Ali treated Frazier was unconscionable, especially in the lead up to the Thrilla in Manilla with all the gorilla stuff. That is just the kind of shit you don't do to another black man, especially then when civil rights battles were still being fought. For anyone to be questioning Frazier's cred was beyond ridiculous, anyhow. He was a product of the hellhole that is North Philly and stayed true to that neighborhood for his whole life. How much "blacker" was he supposed to be? Ali had a bigger personality and that made him wealthy. Frazier was just a guy who could throw a mean left hook and was tough as nails. Unfortunately that didn't get him anything more than a room with a couch above a rank boxing gym for the last years of his life.

RIP.

 

I am not arguing that Futch shouldn't have thrown in the towel. But what they didn't know was that Ali came back to his corner and was begging Angelo Dundee to cut his gloves off and call the fight, too. He could barely stand and was ready to give up. After Futch threw in the towel, Ali stood up and fell right down to the canvas exhausted. Neither fighter was fit to go on, but Ali got the decision, because Futch threw in the towel. Ali won the fight. But they fought each other to exhaustion and if Futch had actually listened to Frazier and let him go back out there, the outcome might have been different because Ali was in bad shape.