Ali

by Jonathan Eig

  Plimpton found Ali in the driveway: Plimpton, Shadow Box, 200.

  An oil painting of Elijah Muhammad: Ibid., 201.

  “When is this going to appear?”: Ibid., 203.

  “That long long walk”: Ibid., 204.

  “Not as much as I thought I would”: Ibid., 206.

  Ali had misspelled his own name: “Classification Questionnaire,” Selective Service System, March 13, 1961, National Archives and Records Administration.

  described later by one of the justices as “confused”: Marty Lederman, “The Story of Cassius Clay v. United States,” ScotusBlog.com, June 8, 2016, http://www.scotusblog.com/­2016/06/­muhammad-ali-conscientious-objection-and-the-supreme-courts-struggle-to-understand-jihad-and-holy-war-the-story-of-cassius-clay-v-united-states/.

  read The Autobiography of Malcolm X: Ibid.

  “The very dominant idea in Islam”: Muhammad, Message to the Blackman in America, 322.

  “pee-wee”: Thomas Krattenmaker, interview by author, June 29, 2016.

  It was 9:15 a.m.: “A Day for Victory Outside Ring,” New York Times, June 29, 1971.

  “I just heard on the radio”: Ibid.

  $250,000 in legal fees: “Judges’ Decision Today: 5-3-1, Favor Ali?” New York Times, June 28, 1971.

  “I’m not going to celebrate”: “A Day for Victory Outside Ring.”

  “Timber!”: “Ali’s Remark Ended Wilt’s Ring Career,” Los Angeles Times, January 15, 1989.

  “I can’t represent the Muslims again”: “Ali Will Quit after Fighting Joe,” Lompoc (CA) Record, June 23, 1971.

  lacked the energy for training: “A Day for Victory Outside Ring.”

  “They only did what they thought”: Ibid.

  “Every time Ali wins”: Donald Reeves, “The Black Prince,” New York Times, May 17, 1971.

  “I wouldn’t say that I have become a symbol”: “Muhammad Ali: World’s Greatest Fighter,” Sacramento Observer, February 25, 1971.

  “right on the button”: “Tired Ali Unimpressive in Dayton Exhibition, Hints at Retirement,” Xenia (OH) Daily Gazette, June 26, 1971.

  “Another year and I’m through”: Ibid.

  Bugner popped Ali consistently: “Ali Gets Down to Serious Work,” New York Times, July 24, 1971.

  “I ain’t going to start nothing”: “The Lip Hits Deck,” Pacific Stars and Stripes, July 24, 1971.

  Dundee thought Ellis had a chance: Ibid.

  “I wasn’t going to kill myself”: “Ali Stops Ellis in Closing Minute of 12th Round,” New York Times, July 27, 1971.

  saw signs of lasting brain damage: Ferdie Pacheco, interview by author, December 30, 2013.

  “There is no fucking cure”: Ibid.

  “You can have me kidnapped!”: Bob Goodman, interview by author, December 4, 2014.

  “He was never in one place”: Bob Foster, interview by author, June 12, 2014.

  played pranks on Dundee: Angelo Dundee, interview, ESPN Classic.

  “I saw birds and all different colors”: Bob Foster, interview by author, June 12, 2014.

  36. TRICKERATION

  “It’s never about the money”: Bob Arum, interview by author, November 17, 2015.

  “Don’t let nuthin’ happen to Joe Frazier”: “An Abrupt End to the Frazier Reign,” New York Times, January 23, 1973.

  “It ain’t too late”: “At 30 a Man Learns, Even Muhammad Ali,” New York Times, September 14, 1972.

  accounts at Peat Marwick: Gene Kilroy, interview by author, December 13, 2014.

  “I’m going to make my wife”: “At 30 a Man Learns, Even Muhammad Ali.”

  “It was very normal”: Jamillah Ali, interview by author, July 25, 2015.

  “I’m never home too much”: Muhammad Ali, interview by Nikki Giovanni, 1971, www.youtube.com.

  “Belinda . . . come on over here”: Thomas Hauser, Muhammad Ali Memories (New York: Rizzoli, 1992), unnumbered page.

  “I don’t want nobody whispering”: “At 30 a Man Learns, Even Muhammad Ali,” New York Times, September 14, 1972.

  “Because my black brothers”: “Ali Deflects Quick Jab after Fight,” New York Times, September 21, 1972.

  “I transcend earthly bounds”: “Playboy Interview: Don King,” Playboy, May 1988.

  “a street Machiavelli”: Jack Newfield, Only in America (New York: William Morrow, 1995), 3–4.

  “a 50-carat setting”: “The Fight’s Lone Arranger,” Sports Illustrated, September 2, 1974.

  grossing fifteen thousand dollars a day: Newfield, Only in America, 3.

  Garrett owed King six hundred dollars: Ibid.

  it would give him a legitimate: Lloyd Price, interview by author, July 30, 2015.

  Price arranged first for King: Ibid.

  “We’re blacks and we have nothing”: Newfield, Only in America, 37.

  King made thirty thousand dollars: Ibid., 30.

  freezers to Eskimos: “Playboy Interview: Don King,” Playboy, May 1988.

  $225,000 in cash: Reggie Barrett, interview by author, March 4, 2016.

  “I had tons of cash”: Don King, interview by author, December 13, 2015.

  “Ali, he wanted it all”: Don King, video interview by independent journalist Andy Quinn, December 14, 2014, courtesy of Andy Quinn.

  “Cash is king”: Don King, interview by author, December 13, 2015.

  “They could not get another black”: Don King, video interview by Andy Quinn, December 14, 2014.

  During their meeting, Elijah Muhammad: Don King, interview by author, December 13, 2015.

  three weeks in the hospital: Kram, Ghosts of Manila, 149.

  He just comes on in: “Set for a Wood Chopper’s Brawl,” Sports Illustrated, January 15, 1973.

  “I just pulled out the flag”: Ibid.

  “I got hit and hit and hit”: “People in Sports: Same Old Ali,” New York Times, February 13, 1973.

  King eased his way toward Foreman’s corner: “Playboy Interview: Don King,” Playboy, May 1988.

  “I came with the champion”: Newfield, Only in America, 47.

  “I’m still greater than boxing”: “People in Sports: Same Old Ali.”

  “You got to get the hard-on”: Joyce Carol Oates, On Boxing (New York: Harper Perennial, 2006), 30.

  paid only three hundred dollars: “The Bugle Call Champion,” Sports Illustrated, June 12, 1978.

  five-to-one favorite: “Ali-Frazier Match Goes Way of Devalued Dollar,” New York Times, April 2, 1973.

  more than 2,500 bombings: Bryan Burrough, Days of Rage (New York: Penguin, 2016), 5.

  “bombs basically functioned”: Ibid.

  sprained an ankle: Gene Kilroy, interview by author, July 19, 2016.

  in bed with two hookers: Reggie Barrett, interview by author, March 4, 2016; Khalilah Camacho-Ali, interview by author, March 4, 2016.

  mirror off the dresser: Reggie Barrett, interview by author, March 4, 2016.

  “That night, I could have beaten Godzilla”: Stephen Brunt, Facing Ali (Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2002), 175.

  instead of ducking or blocking them: Ibid., 170.

  “Is he now but a relic”: ABC television broadcast, March 31, 1973, www.youtube.com.

  “What’s wrong with your fighter?”: Ibid.

  the second knuckle on his right hand: “The Mouth That Nearly Roared,” Sports Illustrated, April 23, 1973.

  “I think he’s loosened a tooth”: Ibid.

  about things buried deep: Khalilah Camacho-Ali, interview by author, March 4, 2016. In this interview, Khalilah said her outburst was caused in part by the loss and by her discovery that he had slept with prostitutes before the fight, but also by a third factor she declined to discuss.

  “I put three cops in the hospital”: Ibid.

  “I think you’re a jerk”: “Norton Stuns Ali, Wants Foreman,” Hayward (CA) Daily Review, April 1, 1973.

  More troublingly, some of the men: Ferdie Pacheco, interview by author, December 30, 2013.

  a broken jaw was as s
erious: “Ali’s Stock Plummets, Jaw Aches Too,” Winnipeg Free Press, April 2, 1973.

  “He’s no different from Chubby Checker”: Lee Winfrey, “Fall of Muhammad: Is It Tragedy or Merely Time?” Chicago Tribune, April 15, 1973.

  37. A FIGHT TO THE FINISH

  gray Rolls-Royce: “New Act, Same Ali,” Ames (IA) Daily Tribune, May 4, 1973.

  “Best thing ever happened to me”: Ibid.

  “I needed that”: “Wired Jaw Fails to Silence a Humble Ali,” New York Times, May 4, 1973.

  “Losing that fight”: Ibid.

  sit in an old wooden surrey: Richard Hoffer, Bouts of Mania (Boston: Da Capo Press, 2014), 118.

  “The camp was like a revolving door”: Bob Goodman, interview by author, December 4, 2014.

  “Every guy that shakes hands”: Angelo Dundee, transcript of interview with ESPN SportsCentury, n.d., courtesy of ESPN.

  paid members of his entourage: “Ali, of Course, Favors Louisville Bout, But . . .” Louisville Courier-Journal, March 25, 1975.

  Lloyd Wells . . . arranged for women: Khalilah Camacho-Ali, interview by author, November 21, 2014.

  “These people are like a little town”: “Ali and His Entourage,” Sports Illustrated, April 25, 1988.

  “They treated her like”: Ibid.

  “We all loved Ali”: Lowell Riley, interview by author, March 14, 2014.

  interviews with Ali cost fifty dollars: Angelo Dundee, transcript of interview with ESPN SportsCentury.

  “Ang, we got legs”: Ibid.

  best shape of his life: “Sights and Sounds from Muhammad Ali,” New York Times, September 6, 1973.

  “Norton don’t stand a chance”: “Ali Is ‘Dancing’ on His Mountaintop,” New York Times, August 26, 1973.

  “You the boss with the hot sauce”: Ali v. Norton, www.youtube.com.

  “That’s what he went to the hospital for”: “Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier Scuffle in TV Studio,” ABC-TV, January 24, 1974, http://abcnews.go.com/­WNT/video/­muhammad-ali-joe-frazier-scuffle-tv-studio-14906366.

  You gotta stop him to win!: “Once More, from Memory This Time,” New York Times, January 29, 1974.

  Ali rocking from one foot: “Muhammad Ali vs Joe Frazier 2 Full Fight,” www.youtube.com.

  Red Smith of the New York Times: Daniel Okrent, ed., American Pastimes: The Very Best of Red Smith (New York: Literary Classics of the United States, 2013), 418.

  “He had me out on my feet twice”: “Ali Says ‘No Bad Feeling between Us,’ and Talks of Super Fight III,” New York Times, January 29, 1974.

  “Take a stiff tree branch”: “Playboy Interview: Muhammad Ali,” Playboy, November 1975.

  38. HEART OF DARKNESS

  walking in circles: Hank Schwartz, interview by author, July 27, 2016.

  marriage had collapsed: Newfield, Only in America, 52.

  lacked faith in his business managers: George Foreman, By George: The Autobiography (New York: Villard Books, 1995), 99–100.

  “terrible emptiness . . . meaner by the day”: Ibid., 99.

  talking nonstop and waving sheets: Hank Schwartz, interview by author, July 27, 2016.

  “I know people been screwin’ you”: “The Fight’s Lone Arranger,” Sports Illustrated, September 2, 1974.

  “This isn’t just another fight”: Ibid.

  an advance of $100,000: Hank Schwartz, interview by author, July 27, 2016.

  “This is my promotion”: “The Fight’s Lone Arranger,” Sports Illustrated, September 2, 1974.

  after two hours of circling: Hank Schwartz, interview by author, July 27, 2016.

  They would decide which: Ibid.

  Ali would get $200,000 more: Hank Schwartz, From the Corners of the Ring to the Corners of the Earth (Valley Stream, NY: CIVCOM, 2009–10), 155.

  “He just repeats the same simplicity”: Victor Bockris, Muhammad Ali in Fighter’s Heaven (New York: Cooper Square Press, 2000), 125–26.

  “If it wasn’t for the Nation of Islam”: Gene Kilroy, interview by author, May 16, 2014.

  organization was running out of money: “Black Muslim Group in Trouble from Financial Problems and Some Crime,” New York Times, December 6, 1973.

  Ali had been dispatched to Libya: Ali and Durham, The Greatest, 209.

  “Now what do you say, Muhammad Ali?”: Kram, Ghosts of Manila, 9.

  “When Ali came back from exile”: Hauser, with Ali, Muhammad Ali, 201.

  “hitting a little bit below the belt”: Jim Brown, interview by author, June 25, 2014.

  $500,000 from an organized crime figure: FBI memo, March 11, 1975, Herbert Muhammad File, Malcolm X Manning Marable Collection.

  Schwartz received a phone call: Hank Schwartz, interview by author, July 27, 2016.

  “a walking bank vault”: “The Man Who Stole a Country,” Mail and Guardian (Johannesburg), September 12, 1997.

  “I didn’t give a shit”: Ibid.

  Schwartz and Don King didn’t care: “Zaire Prepares with Pride to Become Battleground for Foreman Ali Fight,” New York Times, July 2, 1974.

  39. FIGHTER’S HEAVEN

  “One more and I’ll be finished”: “Ali Wants Foreman as Finale,” New York Times, March 5, 1974.

  “If you behave like that”: “What They Are Saying,” New York Times, March 31, 1974.

  Ali’s managers promised: Gene Kilroy, interview by author, June 10, 2016.

  Foreman held a press conference: “Foreman Trains at Pleasanton,” Argus (Fremont, CA), July 30, 1974.

  “I’ll just try to beat him”: “Foreman Makes Ali Bout ‘Official,’ ” Long Beach (CA) Press Telegram, July 30, 1974.

  “There’s gonna be a rumble”: Ibid.

  John Ali wound up in a Gabonese prison: Rose Jennings, interview by author, March 10, 2014.

  He and Hank Schwartz formed a company: Ibid.

  prices starting at $2,100: “Package Deal Expensive,” Glens Falls (NY) Post-Star, August 14, 1974.

  “this event is like no other”: “Zaire: The Toughest Fight Is Just Getting There,” New York Times, August 13, 1974.

  fifty hours and ten thousand miles: “Press Corps Finally Arrives in Zaire,” Chicago Tribune, September 18, 1974.

  most of them clad in bikinis: Bill Caplan, interview by author, August 9, 2016.

  “How did we pick the women?”: Bill Caplan, interview by author, February 2, 2015.

  Mobutu ordered a fleet of buses: “Zaire Prepares with Pride to Become Battleground for Foreman Ali Fight.”

  “Zaire’s foreign minister said”: Rose Jennings, interview by author, March 10, 2014.

  “A new emphasis on self-improvement”: Tom Borstelmann, The 1970s: A New Global History from Civil Rights to Economic Inequality (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012), 12.

  “Round One — bing!”: Dave Kindred, “Getting Inside Ali,” Midwest Magazine, September 1, 1974.

  “I wouldn’t have said that thing”: Ibid.

  “The way I feel”: “Playboy Interview: Muhammad Ali,” Playboy, November 1975.

  218 pounds: “The Voice in the Wilderness,” New York Times, August 17, 1974.

  “Ali’s had it”: Plimpton, Shadow Box, 226.

  “The time may have come”: Kindred, Sound and Fury, 198.

  “Cosell, you’re a phony”: Ibid., 199.

  “I LOVE HIM BECAUSE HE’S THE GREATEST”: Khalilah Camacho-Ali, interview by author, December 23, 2014.

  Belinda loved the movie: Ibid.

  “Discreet Lodging: Maury Z. Levy, “Poor Butterfly,” Philadelphia Magazine, n.d. (c. 1975), https://mauryzlevy.wordpress.com/­2012/06/­15/poor-butterfly/.

  “It’s befitting that I leave the game”: Muhammad Ali press conference, New York City, September 1974, in When We Were Kings, Universal Studios, 2005.

  “Some people . . . have no imagination”: “Does Ali Have a Chance against Foreman?” Sport, September 1974.

  Ali admitted that he had not: “Penthouse Interview: Muhammad Ali,” Penthouse, June 1974.

/>   “If you think the world was shook”: “Sports News Briefs,” New York Times, September 5, 1974.

  always knew when her parents: Veronica Porche, interview by author, May 25, 2016.

  whispered his approval: Gene Kilroy, interview by author, June 21, 2016.

  “That was it”: Veronica Porche, interview by author, May 25, 2016.

  40. “ALI BOMA YE!”

  Ali, his wife, his parents: “Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, Who Is . . . ?” New York Times, September 10, 1974.

  “This is strange to the American Negro”: Muhammad Ali interview in When We Were Kings.

  “100,000 new faces every night”: “Getting Inside Ali.”

  “Then you got the world’s greatest fighter”: Muhammad Ali interview with David Frost, BBC, n.d., www.youtube.com.

  “If he wins, we’re slaves”: Ibid.

  “my country”: “Broken Glasses at the Waldorf,” New York Times, June 24, 1974.

  “I’ll beat your Christian ass”: New York Times used “expletive deleted” instead of “ass,” but other news agencies used “tail,” which strongly suggests the deleted word was “ass.” Ibid.

  “If he considers Zaire”: Dave Anderson, “Broken Glasses at the Waldorf,” New York Times, June 24, 1974.

  Ali apologized: “Muhammad Ali’s ‘Rumble in the Jungle,’ ” Louisville Courier-Journal, September 15, 1974.

  entertained notions of joining: George Foreman, interview by author, September 28, 2015.

  “I figured if a religion couldn’t”: Foreman, By George, 106.

  “our shining black prince”: “The Darker Side of Muhammad Ali,” Salon, http://www.salon.com/­2001/­06/­06/ali_2/.

  “Who do these people hate?”: Gene Kilroy, interview by author, May 16, 2014.

  He asked a reporter how many people: Ibid.

  “I am the greatest!”: Ibid.; Jerry Izenberg, interview by author, May 23, 2016.

  “the oppressor of all black nations”: “Chant of the Holy War: ‘Ali, Bomaye,’ ” New York Times, October 28, 1974.

  not fond of dogs: “Cut ’n Run versus the Big Gun,” Sports Illustrated, October 28, 1974.

  “Ali boma ye!”: Ali v. Foreman, www.youtube.com.

  “He did not look like a man”: Norman Mailer, The Fight (New York: Vintage Books, 1997), 44.

  “Excuse me for not shaking hands”: Ibid., 45.