Where did the trail really start?? LOL
Something that kind of amuses me today is when people still get so mad at Muhammad Ali for what they believe is his influence of the multitude of trash talking, bragging, egomaniacal athletes that have saturated the sports world over the last twenty years or so. I would have to agree that Ali's influence is still felt and, really, it's a shame that the high majority of these guys that feel they are "marketing themselves" with their own brand of braggadocio have really, honestly and truly, not been able to capture the context that Ali worked his magic in. That's another story, though. My thing now is that I seem to notice that the high majority of those people that blame Ali for the guys now are white people that aren't really feeling the trash talking culture and that's understandable when you take into account the deep down differences between the races. White people didn't exactly invent "The Dozens," you know? With that said, though, I kind of have to laugh to myself when I see some guy from three generations ago complaining about Ali's (perceived) negative influence on the black athlete from today because they obviously do not know who influenced Ali. Some of them even speak in very bitter tones as they bash him for his "big mouth" (like the fact that he talked a lot in some way lowered his level of greatness as a boxer) and you definitely get the impression that is more than personal when they speak of his arrogance and they don't just dislike the fact that he talked a lot but they hate the fact that he is black and talks a lot. They blame the current state of trash talking in professional sports as a whole on him and while I agree to a certain degree that he was directly or indirectly a huge influence on athletes and that influence has trickled down to some of the more ignorant athletes of today who have totally taken Ali's showmanship out of context but, in any event, I have some serious, eye opening news for most of those people that do in fact blame the Louisville Lip for his brashness and the resulting mess of today. Ready?? OK. Chew on this one, boys: It was a white man that originally (in a face to face meeting) gave Ali the advice and idea to promote himself in the manner that he eventually did. Back in 1962 the young Cassius Clay met the famous blonde haired wrestler named Gorgeous George when they both appeared on a Las Vegas radio show promoting upcoming matches that each of them had and Clay was amazed at the brashness of the wrestler as he said of his upcoming opponent "If this bum beats me, I’ll crawl down Las Vegas Boulevard on my hands and knees. But it won’t happen. I’ll tear his arm off. For I am the greatest wrestler in the world!”
I suppose this is where Ali got the idea to yell into the microphones at the first Frazier weigh-in before their 1971 fight "If Joe Frazier whups me I'll get down on my hands and knees, crawl across the ring, look up to him and say 'You're the greatest, Joe."
Seeing Clay was interested in his act George apparently spoke with Cassius after the show was over and gave the kid the advice that would set the wheels in motion for the most interesting, exciting, quotable boxer in history to be born, telling him something to the effect of "When I talk as much as I do it makes it so that even the people that hate me as a result want to watch me and that's what I want because, see, it doesn't matter if they come to see me win or to see me get crushed. As long as they pay for their ticket to get in then I have succeeded."
And from that the boxing braggart that also eventually made people either love him or hate him was born and, if anything, Gorgeous George was right on because even the people that hated Ali and called him every negative name they could think of still paid good money to watch the Ali-Frazier fight back in 1971 (hoping he would lose, of course).
So remember something the next time you complain about Ali and his influence on "all these loud mouth athletes today." The trail leads back further than Ali right to the mouth of the "big mouth white boy," Gorgeous George :)
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