Muhammad Ali: A Tribute to the Greatest (25 page)

WILLIAM NACK [SPORTSWRITER]:
Even though he’s still with us, I miss him. I miss his voice. I miss his sense of the absurd. Ali had a sense of the unpredictability and craziness and hypocrisy of life. I wish he was still running around, making speeches and doing all the other things he used to do. You know, in addition to being the quintessential civil disobedient and a walking lesson in decency and independence, Ali was one of the few people I know of who could make almost anyone laugh out loud.

ROBERT LIPSYTE:
Athletes die young. And ultimately, all athletes make a Faustian bargain that they have to pay off on in the end. So for the people who hated Ali, everything is fine now. He’s a ruin; he’s a wreck. And in retrospect, weren’t they confident all the time that it would end this way as they moved on with their own civil-service kind of lives toward picket fences, retirement, and whatever else they think of as security.

TIM WITHERSPOON:
One thing bothers me about me and Ali. [In 1986] I was getting ready to fight Tony Tubbs in Atlanta. And to sell tickets for the fight, Don King brought Ali in to spar with me. That’s when people were starting to talk a lot about how Ali took too many punches and he’s not coordinated and he’s not talking right. Ali wanted to slow the talk down, so he sparred with me for a week. Every day, he had on a sweatsuit, headgear, mouthpiece. And in the ring, he’s telling me to hit him in the head. “You can punch me; hit me hard. Come on, sucker; give me your best shot. Go to the head.” In my mind, I didn’t want to do it. But I was training for a world championship fight, so I went to his body pretty hard. I only went to his head a little bit. But I went to his body hard.

RALPH BOSTON:
I’m not sure I’m good enough with words to express what I feel when I see Ali today. Maybe what I should say is, I remember all the chance meetings he and I had, passing each other in airports, heading in different directions. I’d see him through the crowd and wave, and he’d wave back, and maybe we’d talk for ten seconds. At the beginning, he was always so incredibly vocal and alive. But then I began to see that he was getting a step slower and talking a little softer. And seeing him now—he’s still alive; he’s still sharp mentally—but it bothers me.

DICK SCHAAP:
As the years have gone by, I think it’s become harder and harder to be Muhammad Ali. It’s probably the toughest role that anybody has had to play in the twentieth century. And to play that role twenty-four hours a day, day after day, year after year; I think that’s taken as much of a toll on him as the punches.

LOU DIBELLA:
I hear people talking about how they feel sorry for Ali, and isn’t what happened to him terrible. But to be honest with you, I don’t have that reaction. Sure; it makes me sad that his health isn’t what it used to be. But he’s still the same person. He still enjoys life. The sense of decency and principles that drove him in the 1960’s still drive him. What does bother me though, is the way some people react to Ali; like he’s infirm or mentally deficient or in need of care. Watching people react to Ali like that depresses me. Seeing Ali himself is still very much uplifting to me.”

LONNIE ALI:
There are times when Muhammad allows his physical condition to take things away from him unnecessarily. He doesn’t speak as often as he should; partly because he doesn’t like the way he sounds, and partly because he can accomplish most of what he wants to accomplish by communicating non-verbally. Still, I have to say that Muhammad isn’t as self-confident as he used to be, and still should be. Sometimes, I think back to how in love he was with the camera, and how in love the camera was with him. And it makes me sad to see the way Muhammad sometimes shies away from cameras today.

BETTY SHABAZZ:
Muhammad Ali has been a giver and not a taker. He lived life as he saw it. I look at his physical condition and I cannot bear it. I know he could have done differently; but he didn’t, so we accept what he is. I hope that people will speak kindly of him, always.

RALPH WILEY [SPORTSWRITER]:
People look at Ali’s condition today and say, “That’s sad.” But they forget that, over the years, Ali punched a lot of people. He did damage to other peoples’ brains too.

JOE FRAZIER:
God has shut him down. He can’t talk no more because he was saying the wrong things.

MUHAMMAD ALI:
I’d rather be punished here in this life than in the hereafter.

JULIAN BOND:
Ali doesn’t say as much now as he did before, but he doesn’t have to. He said it all, and said it when almost no one else would.

TIM WITHERSPOON:
When I see Ali today, the way he is now, I wish it wouldn’t be.

ROY JONES [AFTER A 1997 MOCK SPARRING SESSION WITH ALI IN WHICH NO BLOWS WERE STRUCK BUT A LOT OF STRATEGIZING WENT ON]:
“When I’m fighting, the first thing I do is, I want to see my opponent’s jab to find out if there are any flaws in it. The first time my opponent makes a mistake, I pick up on it. The moment Ali and I started sparring, I could see he was searching for the hole, looking for a flaw in my jab. Right away, he picked up on something I do that I can get away with because of my speed. He thought was a flaw and he found it. I’ve never seen anyone who could go out and search for the flaws that quickly. I said to myself, this guy fights like I do. I run fights against guys like Sugar Ray Robinson and Marvin Hagler through my head from time to time. I have a strategy for beating all of them. So after sparring with Ali, I asked myself, “If I was fighting the young Muhammad Ali and we were both the same size, what would I do?” I don’t know the answer. If I was fighting the young Ali, I’d try to get inside his head, jab with him, go to the body. There’d be no sense in trying to knock him out. But then again, it would be very hard to outpoint him. In a lot of ways, it would be a tactical fight. But to be honest, against Ali when he was young, I don’t see much that anyone could do with him. And I’ll tell you something else. Sparring with Ali has made me feel better about where he’s at today. Physically, he’s still strong and a lot quicker than I thought he’d be. The man could get in a boxing ring tomorrow and beat the average person walking down the street easily.

REGGIE JACKSON:
Muhammad likes me. I can feel him like me. I don’t think he knows or understands or cares what I’ve accomplished in baseball. I’ve told him that I was called Mr. October, but that doesn’t mean anything to him. He has no idea that I hit five hundred home runs or what that means. Still, I have to say, it’s a nice feeling, to be liked by Muhammad Ali.

RON BORGES:
I was in Miami for the Super Bowl a couple of years ago. It was a Friday night, and I was on a bus full of sportswriters who were about to leave for one of those big Super Bowl parties. Anyway, I looked up and there was Ali getting on the bus. The first thing Ali did when he got on was reach out and shake hands with the bus driver. And of course, not a single one of us on the bus except for Ali had in any way acknowledged the driver. Then we got to the party. We walked in and the first thing Ali did was shake hands with two waiters who were at the door. Don Shula saw Ali and came running over, but Ali stood there talking with the waiters and Shula had to wait his turn. That’s the way Ali was the entire night. All the little people—the waiters, the busboys, the people that most of us never bother to think about—Ali stopped for every one of them.

FERDIE PACHECO:
Ali has an awareness that he’s somebody gigantic in this world. But the truth is, he’s remarkably humble and it’s not an artificial humility. As far as using ego in the sense of a Hollywood actor or some superstar athlete who’s puffed up by his fame and self-importance, there’s none of that. “I’m the great Ali; give me a hotel room.” Never. “I’m Ali; get me on this airplane even if you have to throw someone else off.” Not a chance. He’s just not like that.

CRAIG HAMILTON [BOXING COLLECTIBLES EXPERT]:
I remember going to a sports memorabilia show at Hofstra University. Ali was there and I had some photographs I wanted him to sign. He was sitting at a table. I handed him the photos. He looked at each one very carefully. And one came up; it was that famous photo you’ve seen of Cassius Clay sitting on a mountain of money. Anyway, Ali stared at the photo for a long time and then he asked how much money I wanted for it. I said what I hope anyone would say under those circumstances: “Champ, it’s yours.” And I’ll never forget; Ali stood up, put his arms around me, and hugged me like I’d just given him, not the photo, but the whole mountain of money. That’s the way Ali is. He appreciates every little thing that anyone does for him and doesn’t think twice about giving away the world.

LOU DIBELLA:
One night, several years ago, I took my wife to dinner in Manhattan. As we were walking to the restaurant, I saw something close to a mob on the sidewalk. It was a crowd of people around Muhammad Ali, who was signing autographs. Anyway, my wife and I had dinner. And when we came out of the restaurant, Ali was still there, playing with kids, posing for pictures, signing for everyone who came up to him. I think about that now, when I look at today’s athletes, who in the larger scheme of things mean absolutely nothing, who make millions of dollars, who won’t take five seconds to give a kid an autograph. And I compare today’s so-called “superstars” with Ali; a man in his fifties with Parkinson’s syndrome, standing on the street that night, embracing every person he met.

MUHAMMAD ALI:
Every time I give an autograph, the person I give it to goes off happy and smiling and keeps my autograph forever. And to me, it’s just a little thing, no more than a couple of seconds.

DR. DENNIS COPE [ONE OF ALI’S PERSONAL PHYSICIANS]:
In the end, what impresses me most about Muhammad is his extraordinarily charitable spirit. He’s an incredibly giving man and always seems able to marshal the resources to help whoever might be around him. I remember one time when he was at the UCLA Medical Center. There was a patient in the hospital, an elderly man who was near death, who was a big fan of his. I asked Muhammad if he would go down to see him, and Muhammad said yes. We went down to this other patient’s room, but he was off the floor for a procedure. I said to Muhammad, “Well, that’s too bad; we weren’t able to see him.” And Muhammad said, “No, let’s wait for him.” We waited for half an hour, and the man still hadn’t come back, so Muhammad said, “Let’s go look for him.” Finally, we found him. Muhammad talked with him for a while and then went back to the room with him and they talked some more. This man’s spirits were so lifted by meeting Muhammad. I can’t tell you how happy it made him. He talked about it constantly until he died. I’ve been astounded so many times like that by Muhammad’s capacity to give. I’ve never seen him disappoint anybody who wanted a moment of his time.

LONNIE ALI:
It’s gratifying for Muhammad to see the way people respond to him. And what’s even more gratifying is the way young people who weren’t even born when Muhammad was fighting are drawn to him. These are five and six-year-old children, who come up to Muhammad and hug him. It’s truly a blessing from God that the love Muhammad has for people and the love people have for him keeps growing from generation to generation, and that every new generation of children seems to know who Muhammad is.

BETTY SHABAZZ:
One of the things that has been constant through Muhammad Ali’s life is that he loves children. His children, other people’s children. I don’t think that Muhammad Ali could have too many children.

MARYUM ALI:
Everybody knows what my father was like when he was young; the boxing, the controversies, I am the greatest. But they don’t understand what he’s doing now and how deeply he believes in Islam. As soon as he changed his name to Muhammad Ali, he began making plans to propagate Islam when he retired. No one took him seriously then. People said, “Well, he won’t really do anything like that.” But he has. He meant it then and he’s doing it now.

MUHAMMAD ALI:
If I could go back in time, I’d like to be there the day Muhammad received the first revelation from God and went home to tell his wife about it. And I’d like to be there with Moses the day he opened up the Red Sea; and with Jesus on the day of the crucifixion to see if it was really him on the cross, because Muslims believe it was someone else.

ROGER WILKINS:
I was the coordinator of Nelson Mandela’s trip through the United States in 1990, and I was extraordinarily moved by the sustained love and joy that greeted him from one end of the country to the other. But after a while, it began to wear him down. Every big-shot politician and celebrity wanted a piece of him. They were all grabbing and grasping. Mandela went through it with incredible grace, but I will tell you, he was unimpressed by the behavior of many of the politicians and so-called superstars that he came in contact with. Then we got to Los Angeles, which is star-studded to begin with, and they turned out every star you can imagine. Mandela was more than tired by then; he was exhausted. We were walking together at yet another fundraising event. Mandela was leaning on me. And all of a sudden, I saw his face light up as I’d never seen it light up before. He looked past me with a radiant smile. I felt his entire body straighten up and come to life. Almost reverentially he whispered, “Champ.” And, of course, walking toward us was Muhammad Ali.

ALEX HALEY [AUTHOR OF
ROOTS
AND MALCOLM X’S COLLABORATOR ON
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MALCOLM X]:
I see Muhammad Ali today very much as a spiritual leader. You know, here’s a man who can go into the Islamic world, which is huge beyond our imagination, and you need troops to clear the way for him. I don’t know if there’s anybody on earth who could go to those countries and draw the crowds that Muhammad Ali can draw. To tell you the truth, and I don’t mean to be irreverent, I doubt the Pope could draw crowds as large as Muhammad Ali. I think he’s probably the single most powerful religious figure in this country, and maybe in the world, today.