Pacquiao vs. Ali?

            The Manny Pacquiao versus Shane Mosley fight was last night.  I followed the round-by-round blow-by-blow via a real-time blog.  It was not a close fight; Pacquiao, the favorite, both with the touts and with the fans, won decisively. 

            Boxing is not as popular as it once was.  This has mostly to do with the fact that there is no Muhammad Ali these days; there is no one as brilliant inside the ring, no one as vibrant outside the ring.

            When I was young, Ali had captured the imagination of everyone, at least among those who had imagination.  He repeatedly did what nobody thought could be done. He defeated Sonny Liston.  During the referee’s instructions, the sports writers present suddenly realized – despite the statistics on the “tale of the tape” – that Ali (then, Cassius Clay) was considerably bigger than Liston.  He defeated Liston in the rematch, also, with the famous “phantom punch”, now clearly discernible with modern technology.  Later in his career, he would come back from a suspension for draft evasion to win back the title.  Still later, he won it for a third time.

Following the suspension, it took Ali several fights, including a title-fight loss to Joe Frazier, to reach the title fight in Zaire.  By the time Ali had earned another title shot, the new champion was George Foreman.  

            In Ali’s time, a heavyweight title fight was a major event, nearly as big as the Super Bowl, and attended by dozens of celebrities – even if it was in Africa.  At ringside for the “Rumble in the Jungle” were famous writers George Plimpton and Norman Mailer.  Nobody  - I mean, nobody - thought Ali could defeat the much younger, much harder-hitting George Foreman.  Of course, he did beat him, in fact, he knocked him out.  

            In last night’s bout, nothing surprising happened. Pacquiao was lackluster and still won handily.  For several years, I have been aware of the existence of a photograph that captures the astonishment of Plimpton and Mailer at the knockout of George Foreman by Muhammad Ali.  Below, please see what it looks like when something surprising does happen.

George Plimpton, center, Norman Mailer, with glasses