Muhammad Ali's WitsCan you imagine Muhammad Ali before the advent of mass communication; the two entities seem almost tailor-made for one another. Ali has provided cameras, pencils, and tape recorders with an unending supply of one liners of bombastic glee; the cameras, pencils, and tape recorders helped transform a prizefighter from Kentucky into the most recognisable person on the planet. Curiously, it was a professional wrestler by the name of Gorgeous George that brought about the dormant verbal rhyming lyrics in Ali. E arly in his career and still using his birth name of Cassius Clay, the young boxer visited a radio station to promote a fight. On that radio was a wrestler that goes by the name Gorgeous George, who also hoped to fill a stadium with paying spectators. The flamboyant wrestler spoke with such audacity that the young Clay himself not only bought a wrestling ticket he also discovered that a little bombastic hype could go along way. What follows are the best quotes, quips, and comments by Muhammad Ali: Muhammad Ali's Wit“I started boxing because I thought it was the fastest way for black people to make it.”
Archie’s been living off the fat of the land. I’m here to give him his pension plan. When you come to fight don’t block the door, ‘Cause you’ll all go home after round four. “I’m so fast I could hit you before God gets the news.” “I’m the prettiest thing that ever put on boxing gloves.” “Boxing’s a rough sport. After every fight I rush to the mirror to make sure I’m presentable.” “That he took a few cups of love and one teaspoon of patience. One tablespoon of generosity. One pint of kindness. One quart of laughter. Mixed it up and stirred it well. And then he spread it over the span of a lifetime and served it to each and every deserving person he met.” Ali, on how he’d like to be remembered “36 is getting to the age. You know it’s time to leave, but something tells you you’ve got one more gamble.”
“All of us boxing people realize evening is here and night will soon befall us.” “The people of the world will love me more now that they see I’m like them. We all lose sometimes. We all grow old. We all die.” Upon losing his final fight “When I’m gone boxing will be nothin’ again.” “Horses get old, cars get old, the pyramids of Egypt are crumbling.” On retiring
“If there’s fighting after I’m gone it’ll just be a dull old thing. No more poems, no predictions, no more hollering.” | 