very sad news late friday night (6/3/16) that muhammad ali has died at 74.

ali was, of course, a three-time world heavyweight champion boxer, but he was so athletically skilled that he very likely could have starred in almost
any sport he chose, including, no doubt, baseball.

his connection to baseball isn't obvious, but it exists, if you look at the wit and humor he brought to the fight game. boxers are clearly under enormous pressure,
[your opponent is trying to knock you into unconsciousness; death is a possibility], yet, despite that, ali always kept his humor as ready as his jab.

for me, the best example of that came during the "rumble in the jungle," his 1974 championship bout with george foreman in zaire.

foreman, 25, was 7 years younger than the 32-year-old ali; foreman was bigger (6'4" 260 pounds to ali's 6'3" 236), he was the unbeaten champion, having
just dispatched joe frazier, and before the fight, at the weigh-in, foreman told the assembled crowd how he was going to take ali apart. foreman went on for
two or three minutes, describing the ways he was going to pulverize the ex-champ; doing this, doing that. lookout poor ali.

the m.c., i think it was howard cosell, turned to ali and said, "what do you think of that, champ?"

ali was uncharacteristically quiet. he looked foreman up and down. he stayed quiet. then he got close to foreman's face and he said one word: "timmmmmmm-ber!"
the audience roared.

that was it. and ali delivered. he took punishing blows from foreman for seven rounds, lying on the ropes (his "rope-a-dope" strategy, during which he
again used humor when, clenched against the ropes and taking one shot after another, repeatedly whispered to foreman, "that the best you got, george?"
later, foreman said, "yeah, i thought to myself, that IS the best i have." )

and, then, in the eighth round, when foreman got too tired to swing anymore, ali rose from the ropes, swung hard with arms that had to have
been sore (he had to calculate how much punishment he could take) and he clocked foreman, a right to the face, sending him spinning to the canvas,
his eyes absolutely dazed, his consciousness, for the moment, gone.

the victory was costly. it no doubt was one of several beatings that sent ali on his way to parkinson's disease.

i've long thought a good part of ali's success could be found in his humor, his ability to see, with wit, and some self-deprecation (his constant
line, "ain't i pretty?" was in part a joke on himself; in part it was not), the amusing in his sport and life.

we don't hit each other in our baseball (or mostly, we don't, there have been some rare and regrettable exceptions), and the pressures we know are
not at all close to what ali knew in the ring.

but every sport, including baseball, brings its pressures. i feel fortunate to have seen more than one player in our league find humor in those
pressures, laugh at them and get others to laugh along, including me. it's no accident that many of those same guys hit .350 or better.

ali would appreciate that.


-mike


-- Edited by mhart on Saturday 4th of June 2016 02:40:44 AM

-- Edited by mhart on Saturday 4th of June 2016 01:51:23 PM

-- Edited by mhart on Saturday 4th of June 2016 01:52:25 PM