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Originally posted by warp1432
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What's interesting is that he benefits from every single controversy in every single fight which is very odd since most fighters with long careers achieve some sort of balance, winning and losing some controversies. The only controversy he loses is outside of the ring, the initial draft conviction and strippage which sees him put on the shelf for 3 yrs.
Many of his controversies involve the premature stoppage of opponents who were game and digging in some good shots on him. Ruby Goldstein mysteriously stops the Banks fight early in the 4th after the rest period when almost no significant punches had landed. Goldstein was coming off his travesty of Paret/Griffin final fight and never reffed another fight.
Maybe Banks corner threw in the towel like in the Logan fight when Logan had been getting his own shots in and had just trapped Ali on the ropes. Seems obvious that Logan's corner had their pockets on Ali as I can't think of why any corner would do such a thing. Logan is completely disgusted.
So, so forth through the Lyle fight that sees Lyle attempting to ropa dope Ali. I can see a legit case for the ref stopping that fight as Lyle does a pretty good acting job on Ali's only moment that he was in the fight. Yet Ali his never warned with threat of a DQ for an obvious non effort through 90% of that fight.
Specifically answering the question, the fights I had Ali absolutely being outboxed by more than a slim margin yet gifted with a decision are Jones, the 2nd Norton fight which wasn't close, clearly the judges were in someone's pockets in all three fights as Kenny in 45 rds of action, pretty well dominates and outworks Ali at least 30 or more.
The 3rd Norton fight was at least close enough that if one hadn't seen the first two, you could roll with an Ali decision based on at least a veneer of credible scoring.
And the Young fight. Poor Jimmy didn't have much of a peak, but when he had it he really got the screws put to him. He should've been the only fighter to beat both Foreman and Ali and might've kept his noggin screwed on better to close out his career instead of diving into deep depression and substance abuse.
So, ignoring all the rest of his controversies too numerous and persistent to bother listing, that 3 fights I had him losing, 1. Jones, who never got the title shot he deserved when he was at his best, 2. Norton, who was effectively frozen out by judges in his title challenges, and 3. Young, also frozen out.
That would gravely affect Ali's final record and title opportunities. On a personal note, Ali's best year in boxing by far is 1972 that sees him in shape, not the tub of goo he often turned up as afterwards, and winning 6 fights against Grade A era contenders of every imaginable stripe. Blue Lewis was the only Grade B contender, though if Lewis or Vitali fought those guys, they'd be heavily criticized.
I'm going to rewatch this fight because of it.
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