Sad to hear about the death of Joe Frazier.
Professional boxing has become a minority interest in recent years, but back in the 1970's it was huge and any fight involving Ali, Frazier,George Foreman and/or Ken Norton etc would be pretty much the biggest sporting event of the year with weeks of build up and analysis in the papers and on TV.
They provided the best sporting theatre around and the 3rd Ali/Frazier fight (the "thriller in Manilla") remains the most brutal sporting event I've ever seen.
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heavyweight boxing "died" at the end of the 70's as the class fighters like Ali, Norton, Foreman et all retired and we were left with a shambolic pile of bloated fools who couldn't fight. Lennox Lewis brought some class back to it in the 90's but what have you got now? the bloody Klitschkos fighting donkeys like Haye.
even the class lighter weight fighters like Duran, Hearns, Hagler, Leonard, Hatton etc have gone and professional boxing is a shadow of it's former self with very few decent boxers around to garner my interest bar perhaps Amir Khan.
They say every great sportsman needs a worthy rival to achieve true greatness (think Ovett/Coe or Borg/McEnroe) and Ali's greatness is defined by his epic contests with George Foreman and on no less than 3 occasions, Joe Frazier.