October 5, 2025 • 28 mins
It's arguably the greatest heavyweight title ever and it fight took place in Manila, Philippines (of all places) with "The Greatest" Muhammad Ali winning the trilogy fight with his arch rival "Smokin' Joe" Frazier dubbed "The Thrilla in Manila!"
And, on the 50th anniversary of Ali's win, we're recapping it on a special "Fight Freaks Unite Podcast!"
Host T.J. Rives and insider Dan Rafael re-live the buildup to their third fight, why it ended up in the Far East and just how ridiculously hot it was that day in the arena?
Ali and Frazier pounded each other for 14 rounds before Frazier's corner stopped the bout for the Ali TKO to retain the heavyweight crown. It's still regarded half a century later as the hardest, toughest battle of both of their hall of fame careers.
This is as good as it gets with nostalgia!
And, make sure to follow/subscribe to this podcast feed on Apple/Spreaker//Spotify, etc.!
And, on the 50th anniversary of Ali's win, we're recapping it on a special "Fight Freaks Unite Podcast!"
Host T.J. Rives and insider Dan Rafael re-live the buildup to their third fight, why it ended up in the Far East and just how ridiculously hot it was that day in the arena?
Ali and Frazier pounded each other for 14 rounds before Frazier's corner stopped the bout for the Ali TKO to retain the heavyweight crown. It's still regarded half a century later as the hardest, toughest battle of both of their hall of fame careers.
This is as good as it gets with nostalgia!
And, make sure to follow/subscribe to this podcast feed on Apple/Spreaker//Spotify, etc.!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Already Folks has mentioned off of a light weekend. This weekend,
it is the Fight Freaks Unite, well not really recap podcast.
It's a special podcast edition and we are glad that
you are with us here on the pod feed as
we are about to discuss the fiftieth I cannot believe it,
the half century anniversary.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
What is that?
Speaker 1 (00:24):
The golden anniversary? The golden anniversary of Muhammad Ali Joe
Fraser three the Thrilla in Manila in October of nineteen
seventy five. I am merely the somewhat capable host TJ Reeves.
Our insider is Big Dan Rayfield. I don't have to
twist your arm to get nostalgic with me. You're all
about this coming up in a couple of moments, right, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
I mean, you know, we talk about old fights all
the time. I mean, as much as we love the
new fights, they create the memories that become the old
fights that we talk about.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
And guess what we hopefully are going to live for
a while longer, and all the fights we've been talking
about for all these years in the recent they're going
to become the oldest algic fights. Uh sooner rather than later,
five years from now, ten years from now, or dare
we even say if you get to fifty years beyond
like with this one. So again on the pod feed, thank.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
You for again. I don't know if either one of
us agat to one hundredth anniversary of the thrown.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
I don't know that if we're in the home and
again we're both toothless and fighting and jousting us. I
like to say, with the plastic silverware, we might be
breaking down.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
We're gonna be on the on the Yeah, I mean,
who know, I don't think. I don't know. We'll see.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
But anyway, thank you for finding us on the pod
feed on Apple, Spreaker, Spotify. Now we should also say
that the video where we're talking the nostalgia, the video
was up on the YouTube page and hopefully you found
that earlier in the evening on Sunday for the thrilling
Manila and talking Ali and the greatness of Ali and
the final fight with Fraser in the end of his career.
(01:47):
So go find the YouTube page as well. We love
it with all the content, and again there'll be some
better fights coming along, but we decided to be nostalgic
for tonight.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
So let's get to it.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Let's get to October one, nineteen seventy five. What was
actually a late morning fight in Manila in the Philippines,
back in the evening primetime in the United States closed
circuit days where they were using, as we've often talked about,
movie theaters that didn't have a lot of crowd in
(02:21):
them early in the week that would they would rent
out a bunch of movie theaters. They would have ballrooms
at hotels different locales to go watch the closed circuit
of this fight. And it's the third fight in the
trilogy of Ali and Fraser. So Dan set it up
here because Fraser had won the first one, Ali had
won a non title rematch, and at the time here
this is Ali coming off the monumental upset of the
(02:44):
seemingly unbeatable George Foreman in Zaire, Africa the year before.
All Right, set us up more on the trilogy fight
here that became the thriller in Manila.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Well, first thing you mentioned about the timing of the
fight that they did in the late morning in the Philippines.
Bob Aram from Top Rank was the motor of this fight,
and I've talked to Bob about this in the past.
And the reason, as you mentioned, was because of the
fact that they wanted it for the primary market, which
is where the money was, which was the United States
of America, for close circuit purposes. And so what I
guess they didn't realize is that the arena where they
(03:14):
held this fight at the time, the Arenete Arena, which
is still in existence and they've still used for events
and they've boxing and all that among other things, didn't
have air condition and it happened that it was at
the time of day where it was going to become
the hottest And so Bob has said to me about
just you know, how sweltering it was, and you could
tell by you know, the amount of exertion, and just
(03:37):
when you watch the fight and just it's a savage,
savage fight. Think about under any circumstances, how brutal it is.
But now think about it, if it's way above the
level of temperature that you'd be used to. It was
probably one hundred degrees in the ring because all over
that and the lighting from the TV.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
It was over a ninety degree day. As the story goes,
and again this facility seated over twenty five thousand people.
So now you pack all the people in breathing in
all the air, you cut the hot TV lights on
and it was easily probably over one hundred and five
degrees and maybe closer to one hundred and fifteen degrees.
(04:14):
But Bob ring for these guys each other continue.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, Bob talks about that when he says it as
far as setting up, Well, the reason why people say, well,
all these fights, you know, thriller Manila's in the Philippines.
You had obviously the Rumbolt and the jungle with Foreman
took place in Zaire. You know when George fought Fraser
and won the title took place in Jamaica. That's because
these governments were paying big site fees to bring the
event there. That was no different in terms of Manila
(04:39):
with the Marcos government to try to bring a positive
light to the Philippines. It's not dissimilar to what we
see with what goes on with the Saudi Arabian events
these days. So aarm and Ali and Fraser went there
to do this fight. You mentioned that he had defeated
in a massive upset in October of nineteen seventy four
to win the Drumm Jungle to regain the heavyweight championship
(05:01):
against George Forman, a monumental upset. He defended the title.
After that, he fought Chuck Webner in the famous fight
that became the basis for Sylvester Stallone's idea for the
Rocky movie. He beat the noted puncher Ron Lyle, He
beat Joe Bugner, who was a longtime contender, and then
in October of seventy six he fought this fight with
Joe Fraser. So he had all those fights over that
(05:23):
period of time. It was only one year basically a
year where he had the three fights. I mean, that
was the time when guys were active. In terms of
Joe Fraser, you mentioned he'd won the first fight, the
fight of the century, lost the second fight, which was
not for the world title, was like for the NABF title,
regional type title. But he had lost a second fight
that ali. This was in January of seventy four. He
(05:45):
then had fought twice incend he had a knockout of
Jerry Quarry, a long time contender. He had a knockout
of Jimmy Ellis, and that set him up for this
third fight against Muhammad Ali. Ali fought for years after
this third fight, only fought two more times after this.
He had the rematch with George Foreman that he got
clobbered in once again, and then he was off for
(06:06):
five years, and then he came back and got a
draw against the legendary Jumbo Cummings, who you probably right, right.
But on the night that Ali and Fraser met for
the second for the third time in the ring, I mean,
it goes down is arguably one of the if not
the greatest fight of all time. I mean, you know,
we can quarrel and discuss about, you know, certain action
(06:26):
fights if you're partial to some of the lighter weights
like a you know, a Chico Corrales against Jose Luis Castillo,
or you know, any number of the smaller weight fights.
There's plenty of them. But in terms of the historical
relevance because of the heavyweight championship being at stake in
this fight, the names associated because of the legendary status
of Ali and Fraser, sort of the unusual location where
(06:47):
the fight took place. For that, you know, he had
that all together, U And it was obviously a different
time for boxing. It's still front page news at the time.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
I was going right there.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
You hat to understand how big a deal this was worldwide,
not just in the United States, that the heavyweight champion
of the world being Muhammad Ali. He had fought all
over the globe. He had fought in Africa. He had
also fought in Europe a couple of times, in England
and in Germany. He had fought, you know, he had
fought all over the place besides just the United States.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Globally.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
It's arguable, but probably he was the most famous athlete
in the world for the better part of about a decade.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
During this time frame, everybody knew who he was. You know.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
The first fight that they had was a great fight.
These guys, you know, Joe Fraser was at his you know,
I guess in his prime, had the knockdown, won the
title or or won millennial title, was already the champion.
I was at a time where Ali was you know,
had been forced into his time off because he didn't
go into the Vietnam War and accept his induction into
the army, so he got suspended. Eventually worked his way
(07:52):
back to the fight. He became the mega event of
the twenty one of the mega sports events of the
twentieth century, and so it was the champion undefeated. Again,
it's the guy with the lineal title, the claims of
the title undefeated, and it was a massive event in
a great fight by the time they got to So
then the second fight happened, which I said, that's the
kind of the forgettable fight of the trilogy. Was not
a spectacular fight by any stretch of the imagination that
(08:13):
we get to the third fight when it.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Was only a twelve round fight too, by the way,
by schedule it only went twelve the distance, and then
you had this one, then you got to this one, right.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
So the difference here is that by the time they
get to the third fight, both guys are still obviously
really good, but they're degraded at that point. They can't
move as well. They didn't have the similar athleticism that
they still had when they fought for the first time
or even for the second time. And when that happens,
and I've seen this in other fights that I've covered,
(08:42):
Guys to have big hearts that didn't change, and guys
can still punch that didn't change. But when you can't
move as well, you're kind of forced to stand in
front of the guy, and you can't get away from
the punches, and it makes it for a much more
sort of grinding, ruling, physical fight. So this third fight
was way more punishing and way more destructive and took
so much more out of these guys than the previous
(09:04):
two fights that it was just something to behold. I mean,
the punishment that these two guys inflicted on each other
is there. There are really not words to describe it,
and Ali did it the best he could. At some
points he talked about it was the closest to death
he could ever have imagined, you know. And if you
want to talk about the accolades that the fight ranging up,
(09:26):
and it's obviously you can find it on YouTube area.
It's just an amazing fight to watch. This goes on
saying it was the fight of the year for nineteen
seventy five by pretty much everybody, ring magazine, you name it,
in the in the midnight, I went and looked this
up because then we're going to be talking about this
in the In nineteen ninety six, the Ring magazine did
its I guess Top fifty or top one hundred fights
or whatever of all time. This was ranked as the
(09:48):
number one fight of all time. Now, do you remember
the Old Sports Century series.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
On ESI right in nineteen ninety nine, right, Yes.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
So they were going right reviewing the twentieth century. This
was named not just for boxing, for all sports. This
was named as the fifth greatest sporting event of the
twentieth century.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So that just sort of explains to you the level
of beyond just a boxing match that this was well.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
And again the magnitude is massive, the fact that Ali
has beaten foreman who had destroyed Fraser. Now, interestingly, when
you go back and watch the fight, and I have
gone back and I've seen the fight a couple of times. Again,
I was a little TJ. You were a little Rayfield
when this was live. But when you go back and
watch the fight, Ali was really in control at the
beginning of the fight, the hand speed, the footwork. But
(10:35):
like you mentioned, father time is catching up with both
of them. He was not going to be able to
sustain that, and it became more of a slugfest.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
It became more of a brawl.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
And that's when Fraser in the fifth round rocks him
with the left hook, and the crowd is oooing and
eyeing and cheering, and it's like okay, now the fight
is on and then Rayfield. They proceed to beat on
each other, oh, and beat on each other for another
eight or nine round until the high drama comes in
the twelfth, the thirteenth, and the fourteenth round, the championship rounds.
(11:05):
Of this fifteenth round fight.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
It was just a battle of attrition. It was not
I mean, I guess that, you know, maybe it would
have gone the distance, but they had so little left
at the end. I mean, you know, if you, if you,
if you fast forward to the end of the fight
where it stopped at the end of the fourteenth round,
where Eddie Futch, you know, the the late great trainer,
Hall of Fame trainer for Joe Frasier, matching up against
another all time great trainer in Angelo Dundee Fromhammad Ali.
(11:28):
He would not let Joe come off the stool for
a round number fifteen. And it was close where maybe
they weren't in a lot. Ali maybe not come out
for the fifteenth round. I mean, both these guys were spent,
and you know, Futch, you know, decided that was enough.
You know, Joe's eyes were messed up, and you know,
Ali obviously was feeling the pain. Also, this was. You know,
(11:49):
we always think about in a boxing match, and I
think about this all the time. You see the guy
who wins, they raised their hand and he wins the fight,
and obviously you see the loser. Obviously if it's a
very hard, tough fight, you're like, oh, you know, he
took a real punishment in that fight. He lost the fight.
The guy who won often takes just as much punishment
as the guy that loses. Its just that he happens
to get his hand raised. But what people, I think
(12:09):
a lot of times in this sport, forget fans and otherwise,
is that the guy that wins often is just as
damaged as the guy who loses. He just happened to
be the guy to get the victory, whether by points
or maybe gets a knockout in this particular case, a
knockout that was maybe a moment away from it going
the other way, you know, where where maybe neither one
of the guys would have been able to come out
and finish the fight. Then you get yourself a technical draw.
(12:31):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
So Ali in the thirteenth round, there's a famous you
know exchange, and you've seen.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
Highlights of it.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
He blasts forem him with a couple of big right
hands and knocks his mouth piece out, has him hurt.
And that's the point in time because I saw an
interview with Eddie Futch where he was talking about it,
where Eddie became very concerned.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
But he was almost find Joe was almost and.
Speaker 3 (12:52):
So this is what I was coming to.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
It was later revealed by Frasier in his book that
he was legally blind. I believe in the right at
this point in time. How they got this pass boxing
commissions and doctors or whatever whatever tactic they used the Philippines.
Now his left eye is swelling shut with Ali blasting
him in the thirteenth round, in the fourteenth round, and
(13:14):
in Futch's interview that I remember seeing somewhere he said,
I had a blind fighter that could not see, and
I was not sending him out there again to take
more punishment and maybe get killed when he could not see.
So it's just amazing that Foreman was able. I'm sorry
that Fraser was able to hang in in a twelfth round,
(13:35):
a thirteenth round, in that sweltering situation without basically being
able to see Ali.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
As he's you know, I don't know if this was
part of Eddie Futch's reasoning for pulling Joe out of
the fight. But he was losing the fight going into
that fourteenth round, so I mean, obviously he probably had
an inkling that his guy was down. You know, if
he had been up big, maybe he lets it go
because you know, if he can take three more minutes
of punishment, he's gonna win the fight. But you know
(14:03):
it was.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Not the case.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
But I mean, they stopped the fight and they immediately
cut over to Ali and you hear the legendary play
by play man on the closed circuit Don Dumpy going,
I think they're stopping the fight, and they see Ali
stand up, and he says Ali has won the fight.
And Ali puts his arms up for a second and
then walks to the middle of the ring and sits
down and then eventually lays down in the middle of
(14:26):
the ring, just exhausted and dehydrated. He reportedly lost like
seven pounds during the fight in waterweight. It was it
was crazy what they put themselves through.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
It was, like they said, about being as near death
as one could imagine and remember going into the fight.
You know, what made it so important for the public,
for the fans is that they had the history of
the rivalry the first two fights, so obviously we're one
and one. They were both superstar heavyweight champions, had been
you know, Fraser had been the champion. They had had
(14:58):
some harsh words with each other, and you know got
into the uh the physical altercation on Wide World of
Sports for Eximp Howard. Yes, so they had had a
lot of well really not both. Then it was really
Ali that had the bad word to say about Joe Fraser,
which hurt him very deeply, even if Falley claims he
didn't really mean it that way. But you know it's
more of a promotional thing. But you know, they had
a very complicated relationship beyond the ring.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Very famously, Ali's at one of the press conferences and
pulls out a rubber toy gorilla and he starts doing
his riff of I'm gonna show you that it's going
to be a thriller when I pound the gorilla in Manila,
and he starts hitting the rubber gorilla right next to
Fraser at Fraser and Fraser's ready to fight him at
the press conference.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Exact quote TJ. It's it's going to be a thriller,
and at Chilla and at Kila when I get the
gorilla in Manila.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
And he's pounding on the rubber gorilla holding it in
his hand, right next to Fraser who's ready to fight him.
There again after they had fought in the New York
studio for ABC on Howard Cosell's show, So there was
a blood And what.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
Made it so amazing though, is that these are heavyweights
who had all time ability to take punishment, who had
gargantua and hearts, who weren't going to give an inch,
and you had to impose yourself on each other. And
that's what they did for this fight. And again, because
they weren't what they were at their best, they kind
of couldn't get out of the way and they just
(16:22):
had to rely more on their heart than on their
skills at this point of their careers.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
And again, we can't say enough the magnitude that this
is front page news worldwide that Ali has won this fight.
It's the lead story on the national news. Remember there's
no Internet, there's no real there's no cable TV, the.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
Cell phone doesn't exist.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
This was such a big deal that Ali had won
this fight on the heels of beating form in the
year before, for the legacy and for the all time. Now,
the important thing in the nostalgia is this wasn't at
the end of the career of either guy, as you
were making read Ali fought a bunch.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Yeah, I mean, in a perfect world, both these guys
probably should have called it a day when this is over.
Obviously it's boxing that wasn't gonna happen. So this was,
like I said October seventy five, Joe has taking a
very bad meeting. In this fight, he retires or you know,
Eddie Fudge pulls him out after round fourteen less than
you know. Seven eight months later June of two, June
of seventy six, he comes back and he has a rematch,
(17:19):
not for the world title, this is a regional title fight.
He has the rematch with George Foreman. Memory comes in
with the with the you know, he's wearing the rope,
but he's got the hood up and when he pulls
the hood off, shows that he's shaved his head bald.
That was kind of a shock to everybody. And George
Foreman knocked him down a couple of times and stopped
him in the fifth round. So obviously got the two
(17:39):
knockout victories, and as I mentioned, then he was pretty
much done for that time. And then that was seventy six,
and then at the end of nineteen eighty one he
came out of retirement for a singular fight against Jumbo Cummings,
fought him to a draw in a ten rounder, and
then never fought again. Now so so in essence, the
Ali third fight ended Joe's career, you know, with the
let's call it the coda of.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
The for all intents and purposes, that was the end
of it.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Now with Ali, totally different ballgames. So he's stilled the
champion because he retained the title because he you know
that he had won back from Foreman in seventy four.
He fights Frasier in the third fight in h now
the amount of punishment takes in October of nineteen seventy five.
He was back in action in February of nineteen seventy six.
I mean he took off just a few months. He
(18:23):
fought in Puerto Rico when he had a fight against
Jean Pierre Coopan, who he knocked out. So he was
very active after that. He went on and actually had
some of his biggest fights, biggest wins and a lot
of you know, added a lot.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Of Yankee Stadium in nineteen six.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Even before that, so after Coopman, he had the Jimmy
Young fight, he fought Richard Dunn in Munich. You know
you mentioned he fought all over the place. He went
to Europe for that fight. Then he had that's the
seventy six fight. This was at Yankee Stadium, the third
fight with Kenny Norton. That was a controversial decision that
Ali won to retain the title. They had split two
previous fights. Norton was always style wise of pain in
(18:58):
the neck for Ali to deal with, and he had
another big problem with him on that night in September
of seventy six and a third fight. And if you
talked to Bob Aram, who was the promoter for that
fight also, he'll tell you that it was after the
as much punishment as Ali talk against Frasier in the
Manila fight. I've talked to Bob in the past and
he said to me, after the seventy six third fight
(19:21):
with Kenny Norton, that's when he felt that Ali should
have retired because he could tell that was the night
where shruck Aram, who promoted by the way like twenty
seven of Muhammad Ali's fights. He knew him extremely well.
They were together for a long time and maintained the
relationship even long after his retirement, to the point where
now he promotes his grandson Nico Ali Walsh. In any event,
(19:41):
it was after the fight with Norton where Bob thought
that should have been the end for Muhammad, but he
was still the heavyweight champion, and of course he continued
to fight. He fought Alfredo Evangelista late in nineteen seventy seventy,
he fought Ernie Shavers again for another time in nineteen
seventy seven, and then he matched up with Leon Spinks
in February of nineteen seventy eight. Obviously, that became one
of the famous upsets of all time. Vally is the
(20:04):
long reigning champion. People maybe are blinded to think that
he's still got it because he's been on a run
of continual defenses. Spinx's uh six oh one had won
the Olympic gold medal but had a draw on his record,
And you know, if they made that kind of match today,
people would go absolutely Luna to right stunning.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
It was stunning. It was stunning that he beat him.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
And again that was an interesting time frame because I'll
y another factor here. Ali was in need of money,
and that's well known. He talked about it, he wrote
about it in his book, and so he was still fighting
frequently because of the money, and there was some money
because of the Spinks name of being an Olympic champion,
et cetera. And it's people don't realize how regularly he
(20:45):
fought after the Fraser fight before we had to Larry
Holmes coming up, but he did.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
He fought a bunch, but.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
He obviously lost that fight to Spinks, one of the
greatest upsets in boxing history. And he's certainly in the
heavyweight division. And Leon Spinks became an a you know,
as much fame and notoriety as the top amateurs had
back the time the nineteen seventy sixth ELEMIT team with
Leon Spinks, with his brother Michael Spinx, with Sugar Ray Leonard.
They became household names. But he became even bigger in
(21:09):
terms of what his profile was after he had the
split decision over Ali to win the title. And then,
of course, you know, later in nineteen seventy eight, eight
months later or whatever it was, he lost in the
giant rematch in New Orleans.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Breaking night in the Superdome. All right, So I'm going
to hit you with a little fun trivia.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
By the way, that was at that moment that seemed
to be the end of Valley, that he was going
to be done.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Right right, But how about when he fought Spinks in
the first fight to give you an idea of the
magnitude of the interest, that was a weak night in
Las Vegas, and they televised it live on CBS, CBS
bid for the fight, CBS Television. Brent Musberger called the
fight that night. At that point, Forty Pacheco, the fight doctor,
(21:52):
had decided I'm not going to be involved with Ali anymore.
I think he should retire.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
But he was on the broadcast, which is good because
Freddy Picheck was a horrible announcer.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
Well, okay, but the fight doctors there, all right.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
CBS had forty three million people watch that night, so again,
different era, fewer channels. You know, Ali was that big
of a deal. Rayfield, We've talked about this before. Do
you remember for the rematch later in September in New Orleans?
The TV audience, how many people watched the Ali Spinks
(22:25):
was like seventy million or something.
Speaker 3 (22:26):
That was why nine zero brother ninety million.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
People because people have three channels and it was a
massive that's right.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
But the magnitude of Ali trying to get the heavyweight
title back once more avenged the loss to Sphinx.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
It was on the level of a super Bowl. I mean, you.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Can't fathom that five million people will watch a fight anymore.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
In today's day. The super Bowl does like one hundred
million people, the one hundred three million, hundred forever. This
was not quite that much. And obviously it's also you know,
decades ago, so there's people in the United States at
that point. But yeah, so it did like a super
Bowl level number.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Like I mean in the present in the present day,
you would kill to get five million people to watch.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
You look up and see what did the super Bowl
broadcast in like nineteen seventy eight or nineteen.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
Oh this was more than it.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
This was more than it on a Sunday afternoon by
by far, I'm sure then the Steelers and the Cowboys or.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
But there was the game was the super Bowl back
at night?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Back then, the super Bowl was in the daytime.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
Back in the they would play it in the afternoon,
in the late afternoon, and this this was just on
a different level that win over Foreman in Africa, the
win and the Thriller Manila that we're talking about right now,
for this just launched Ali even more into the lore
and the fight fans and the magnitude of it. That
ninety million people watched the Sphinx fight and then just
(23:45):
one more time. He retired after that night, but then
came out of the retirement and the anniversary of that
fight is this week. Also right at the same time
as the Thriller in Manila, as he fought Larry Holmes
coming out of retirement.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
Yeah, that should never have happened. I mean, Holmes was
in like a no win situation. He was always in
the shadow of Ali, even though he was becoming a
great champion in his own right at that time. And
it's like in boxing, it happens on a regular basi.
It's the right of passage, it's the passing of the baton.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
You know, he had sparred with Muhammad Ali, he had
been on undercards of his and now he had to
fight him. I don't think he reveled in it. And
he's talked about it, and if you go back, you
can find any number of comments from Larry Holmes for
the years that you know he didn't want to hurt
Muhammad Ali or do any kind of damage to him,
and uh, for whatever reason, Ali took that fight. He
got absolutely destroyed.
Speaker 1 (24:34):
Money again probably and it was obvious that night because
you go back and watch that fight. Ali had nothing
like in the second round and the fight it went
on and on with Holmes just beating on him and
beating on him, and finally they stopped the fight.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Angela Dundee stopped it after the tenth round. And then
as sick as that beatdown was, a year later, you know,
Ali fought again fourteen months later. That was the fight
against ever Berbick in Nasa the Bahamas, which was ultimately
the final fight of his career. But you know, he
could have walked away after the Minila fight and that
(25:09):
would have been good. He certainly could have walked away
after regaining the title against Spinks in the rematch, but
you know, like every fighter, you know, he wanted to
keep going and make the money, like you said, and
you know they took the beatings against Holmes. He didn't
really take a beating against Burbick. He actually didn't look
that horrible against Burbick, as crazy as it sounds. But
those two fights probably should never have happened. But the
(25:31):
The Thriller in Manila, again, my opinion, took so much
out of Ali, took so much out of Frasier that
it probably that should have been. It was a great
I mean, it is an unbelievable fight. It's just mesmerizing
type of battle.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Especially when you take all the factors into account of
the scorching heat and the fact that Fraser basically could
not see in the rounds of the fight. Yeah, and
the and the hatred these two guys had for each
other all through out.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Their careers and even post careers.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
So great nostalgia here for this sharing the time on it.
It's wild that the anniversary of the two fights of
the Thrilling Manila and then Holmes destroying Leir within what
a day of each other, So it's five years apart.
Crazy crazy on that listen, great stuff. Always always love
(26:22):
doing the nostalgic thing.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
By the way, I may say also it may be
a few days between those two fights, but Ali fought
in that same time frame because the Kenny Norton fight
was on September twenty eighth, so a few days earlier.
That's the Yankee stad What's the date.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
On the Spinks revenge fight in September of seventy eight.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
It's September. That was September fifteenth.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
September fifteenth, so, and even.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
September twenty ninth of nineteen seventy seven, that was the
Ernie Shavers fight that he had defending the title. So
he was keeping to that sort of I guess, I
don't know if it was on purpose.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
The Greatest did not shy away from fighting anybody. He
fought everybody seemingly in his era, including this epic fight
with Joe Fraser.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Ask you, I mean, is there a single heavyweight of
consequence in that time frame, from like say, the late
sixties through like till like nineteen eighty ish nineteen, like
late seventies that he didn't fight. No, The answer is no.
He fought everybody, Yes, and that's one of the reason.
And he beat them.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
He beat almost all of them, even if.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
He lost to like, you know, Fraser, he certainly because.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Berbick and Holmes, the last two are the only two
he didn't avenge. He obviously avenged the Fraser loss, he
avenged the Norton loss.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
Career, he fought Holmes and Burbick. I mean not the
Burbick became a great fighter, but I would consider them
to not even really be truly of his era. They
were they were like of the next era.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yes, I would agree with that.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
And the interesting thing, and I wrote about this back
in the day when I was at ESPN when Trevor
Burke was killed, that he is the the bridge, if
you will, between the two ears, because he retired Ali
and lost the title to Tyson. Yeah, so that's the
bridge between those two great eras, those two great fighters,
and those eras of boxing.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
Great stuff on the Nostalgia Again, thank you to the
podcast audience for bearing with us on the Nostalgic podcast here,
and we pledge that as October rolls on and there's
more important and significant fight cards going on, not just
in the US but worldwide, we'll have more on that.
For now, Big Dan, thank you for the trip down
memory lane about the thrilla in Manila and the end
(28:23):
of Muhammad Ali's career in the years after that and
the fights after that.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
All good stuff with this have.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
A good week, my friend. Thank you for this again.
Soon there we go, There goes Big Dan Rayhiel, I'm
merely TJ Reeves. So thank you for finding us here
as part of the Fight Preach Unit podcast here on
this Big Fight Weekend podcast feed.
Speaker 3 (28:44):
We're back again soon enough.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
But we've been talking Thrilla and Manila nostalgia. I don't
want to accept it's fifty years on, but it's fifty
years later. It's great stuff tonight being nostalgic. Thank you
for being with us.
Already Folks has mentioned off of a light weekend. This weekend,
it is the Fight Freaks Unite, well not really recap podcast.
It's a special podcast edition and we are glad that
you are with us here on the pod feed as
we are about to discuss the fiftieth I cannot believe it,
the half century anniversary.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
What is that?
Speaker 1 (00:24):
The golden anniversary? The golden anniversary of Muhammad Ali Joe
Fraser three the Thrilla in Manila in October of nineteen
seventy five. I am merely the somewhat capable host TJ Reeves.
Our insider is Big Dan Rayfield. I don't have to
twist your arm to get nostalgic with me. You're all
about this coming up in a couple of moments, right, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
I mean, you know, we talk about old fights all
the time. I mean, as much as we love the
new fights, they create the memories that become the old
fights that we talk about.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
And guess what we hopefully are going to live for
a while longer, and all the fights we've been talking
about for all these years in the recent they're going
to become the oldest algic fights. Uh sooner rather than later,
five years from now, ten years from now, or dare
we even say if you get to fifty years beyond
like with this one. So again on the pod feed, thank.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
You for again. I don't know if either one of
us agat to one hundredth anniversary of the thrown.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
I don't know that if we're in the home and
again we're both toothless and fighting and jousting us. I
like to say, with the plastic silverware, we might be
breaking down.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
We're gonna be on the on the Yeah, I mean,
who know, I don't think. I don't know. We'll see.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
But anyway, thank you for finding us on the pod
feed on Apple, Spreaker, Spotify. Now we should also say
that the video where we're talking the nostalgia, the video
was up on the YouTube page and hopefully you found
that earlier in the evening on Sunday for the thrilling
Manila and talking Ali and the greatness of Ali and
the final fight with Fraser in the end of his career.
(01:47):
So go find the YouTube page as well. We love
it with all the content, and again there'll be some
better fights coming along, but we decided to be nostalgic
for tonight.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
So let's get to it.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Let's get to October one, nineteen seventy five. What was
actually a late morning fight in Manila in the Philippines,
back in the evening primetime in the United States closed
circuit days where they were using, as we've often talked about,
movie theaters that didn't have a lot of crowd in
(02:21):
them early in the week that would they would rent
out a bunch of movie theaters. They would have ballrooms
at hotels different locales to go watch the closed circuit
of this fight. And it's the third fight in the
trilogy of Ali and Fraser. So Dan set it up
here because Fraser had won the first one, Ali had
won a non title rematch, and at the time here
this is Ali coming off the monumental upset of the
(02:44):
seemingly unbeatable George Foreman in Zaire, Africa the year before.
All Right, set us up more on the trilogy fight
here that became the thriller in Manila.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Well, first thing you mentioned about the timing of the
fight that they did in the late morning in the Philippines.
Bob Aram from Top Rank was the motor of this fight,
and I've talked to Bob about this in the past.
And the reason, as you mentioned, was because of the
fact that they wanted it for the primary market, which
is where the money was, which was the United States
of America, for close circuit purposes. And so what I
guess they didn't realize is that the arena where they
(03:14):
held this fight at the time, the Arenete Arena, which
is still in existence and they've still used for events
and they've boxing and all that among other things, didn't
have air condition and it happened that it was at
the time of day where it was going to become
the hottest And so Bob has said to me about
just you know, how sweltering it was, and you could
tell by you know, the amount of exertion, and just
(03:37):
when you watch the fight and just it's a savage,
savage fight. Think about under any circumstances, how brutal it is.
But now think about it, if it's way above the
level of temperature that you'd be used to. It was
probably one hundred degrees in the ring because all over
that and the lighting from the TV.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
It was over a ninety degree day. As the story goes,
and again this facility seated over twenty five thousand people.
So now you pack all the people in breathing in
all the air, you cut the hot TV lights on
and it was easily probably over one hundred and five
degrees and maybe closer to one hundred and fifteen degrees.
(04:14):
But Bob ring for these guys each other continue.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, Bob talks about that when he says it as
far as setting up, Well, the reason why people say, well,
all these fights, you know, thriller Manila's in the Philippines.
You had obviously the Rumbolt and the jungle with Foreman
took place in Zaire. You know when George fought Fraser
and won the title took place in Jamaica. That's because
these governments were paying big site fees to bring the
event there. That was no different in terms of Manila
(04:39):
with the Marcos government to try to bring a positive
light to the Philippines. It's not dissimilar to what we
see with what goes on with the Saudi Arabian events
these days. So aarm and Ali and Fraser went there
to do this fight. You mentioned that he had defeated
in a massive upset in October of nineteen seventy four
to win the Drumm Jungle to regain the heavyweight championship
(05:01):
against George Forman, a monumental upset. He defended the title.
After that, he fought Chuck Webner in the famous fight
that became the basis for Sylvester Stallone's idea for the
Rocky movie. He beat the noted puncher Ron Lyle, He
beat Joe Bugner, who was a longtime contender, and then
in October of seventy six he fought this fight with
Joe Fraser. So he had all those fights over that
(05:23):
period of time. It was only one year basically a
year where he had the three fights. I mean, that
was the time when guys were active. In terms of
Joe Fraser, you mentioned he'd won the first fight, the
fight of the century, lost the second fight, which was
not for the world title, was like for the NABF title,
regional type title. But he had lost a second fight
that ali. This was in January of seventy four. He
(05:45):
then had fought twice incend he had a knockout of
Jerry Quarry, a long time contender. He had a knockout
of Jimmy Ellis, and that set him up for this
third fight against Muhammad Ali. Ali fought for years after
this third fight, only fought two more times after this.
He had the rematch with George Foreman that he got
clobbered in once again, and then he was off for
(06:06):
five years, and then he came back and got a
draw against the legendary Jumbo Cummings, who you probably right, right.
But on the night that Ali and Fraser met for
the second for the third time in the ring, I mean,
it goes down is arguably one of the if not
the greatest fight of all time. I mean, you know,
we can quarrel and discuss about, you know, certain action
(06:26):
fights if you're partial to some of the lighter weights
like a you know, a Chico Corrales against Jose Luis Castillo,
or you know, any number of the smaller weight fights.
There's plenty of them. But in terms of the historical
relevance because of the heavyweight championship being at stake in
this fight, the names associated because of the legendary status
of Ali and Fraser, sort of the unusual location where
(06:47):
the fight took place. For that, you know, he had
that all together, U And it was obviously a different
time for boxing. It's still front page news at the time.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
I was going right there.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
You hat to understand how big a deal this was worldwide,
not just in the United States, that the heavyweight champion
of the world being Muhammad Ali. He had fought all
over the globe. He had fought in Africa. He had
also fought in Europe a couple of times, in England
and in Germany. He had fought, you know, he had
fought all over the place besides just the United States.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Globally.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
It's arguable, but probably he was the most famous athlete
in the world for the better part of about a decade.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
During this time frame, everybody knew who he was. You know.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
The first fight that they had was a great fight.
These guys, you know, Joe Fraser was at his you know,
I guess in his prime, had the knockdown, won the
title or or won millennial title, was already the champion.
I was at a time where Ali was you know,
had been forced into his time off because he didn't
go into the Vietnam War and accept his induction into
the army, so he got suspended. Eventually worked his way
(07:52):
back to the fight. He became the mega event of
the twenty one of the mega sports events of the
twentieth century, and so it was the champion undefeated. Again,
it's the guy with the lineal title, the claims of
the title undefeated, and it was a massive event in
a great fight by the time they got to So
then the second fight happened, which I said, that's the
kind of the forgettable fight of the trilogy. Was not
a spectacular fight by any stretch of the imagination that
(08:13):
we get to the third fight when it.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Was only a twelve round fight too, by the way,
by schedule it only went twelve the distance, and then
you had this one, then you got to this one, right.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
So the difference here is that by the time they
get to the third fight, both guys are still obviously
really good, but they're degraded at that point. They can't
move as well. They didn't have the similar athleticism that
they still had when they fought for the first time
or even for the second time. And when that happens,
and I've seen this in other fights that I've covered,
(08:42):
Guys to have big hearts that didn't change, and guys
can still punch that didn't change. But when you can't
move as well, you're kind of forced to stand in
front of the guy, and you can't get away from
the punches, and it makes it for a much more
sort of grinding, ruling, physical fight. So this third fight
was way more punishing and way more destructive and took
so much more out of these guys than the previous
(09:04):
two fights that it was just something to behold. I mean,
the punishment that these two guys inflicted on each other
is there. There are really not words to describe it,
and Ali did it the best he could. At some
points he talked about it was the closest to death
he could ever have imagined, you know. And if you
want to talk about the accolades that the fight ranging up,
(09:26):
and it's obviously you can find it on YouTube area.
It's just an amazing fight to watch. This goes on
saying it was the fight of the year for nineteen
seventy five by pretty much everybody, ring magazine, you name it,
in the in the midnight, I went and looked this
up because then we're going to be talking about this
in the In nineteen ninety six, the Ring magazine did
its I guess Top fifty or top one hundred fights
or whatever of all time. This was ranked as the
(09:48):
number one fight of all time. Now, do you remember
the Old Sports Century series.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
On ESI right in nineteen ninety nine, right, Yes.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
So they were going right reviewing the twentieth century. This
was named not just for boxing, for all sports. This
was named as the fifth greatest sporting event of the
twentieth century.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So that just sort of explains to you the level
of beyond just a boxing match that this was well.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
And again the magnitude is massive, the fact that Ali
has beaten foreman who had destroyed Fraser. Now, interestingly, when
you go back and watch the fight, and I have
gone back and I've seen the fight a couple of times. Again,
I was a little TJ. You were a little Rayfield
when this was live. But when you go back and
watch the fight, Ali was really in control at the
beginning of the fight, the hand speed, the footwork. But
(10:35):
like you mentioned, father time is catching up with both
of them. He was not going to be able to
sustain that, and it became more of a slugfest.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
It became more of a brawl.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
And that's when Fraser in the fifth round rocks him
with the left hook, and the crowd is oooing and
eyeing and cheering, and it's like okay, now the fight
is on and then Rayfield. They proceed to beat on
each other, oh, and beat on each other for another
eight or nine round until the high drama comes in
the twelfth, the thirteenth, and the fourteenth round, the championship rounds.
(11:05):
Of this fifteenth round fight.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
It was just a battle of attrition. It was not
I mean, I guess that, you know, maybe it would
have gone the distance, but they had so little left
at the end. I mean, you know, if you, if you,
if you fast forward to the end of the fight
where it stopped at the end of the fourteenth round,
where Eddie Futch, you know, the the late great trainer,
Hall of Fame trainer for Joe Frasier, matching up against
another all time great trainer in Angelo Dundee Fromhammad Ali.
(11:28):
He would not let Joe come off the stool for
a round number fifteen. And it was close where maybe
they weren't in a lot. Ali maybe not come out
for the fifteenth round. I mean, both these guys were spent,
and you know, Futch, you know, decided that was enough.
You know, Joe's eyes were messed up, and you know,
Ali obviously was feeling the pain. Also, this was. You know,
(11:49):
we always think about in a boxing match, and I
think about this all the time. You see the guy
who wins, they raised their hand and he wins the fight,
and obviously you see the loser. Obviously if it's a
very hard, tough fight, you're like, oh, you know, he
took a real punishment in that fight. He lost the fight.
The guy who won often takes just as much punishment
as the guy that loses. Its just that he happens
to get his hand raised. But what people, I think
(12:09):
a lot of times in this sport, forget fans and otherwise,
is that the guy that wins often is just as
damaged as the guy who loses. He just happened to
be the guy to get the victory, whether by points
or maybe gets a knockout in this particular case, a
knockout that was maybe a moment away from it going
the other way, you know, where where maybe neither one
of the guys would have been able to come out
and finish the fight. Then you get yourself a technical draw.
(12:31):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
So Ali in the thirteenth round, there's a famous you
know exchange, and you've seen.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
Highlights of it.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
He blasts forem him with a couple of big right
hands and knocks his mouth piece out, has him hurt.
And that's the point in time because I saw an
interview with Eddie Futch where he was talking about it,
where Eddie became very concerned.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
But he was almost find Joe was almost and.
Speaker 3 (12:52):
So this is what I was coming to.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
It was later revealed by Frasier in his book that
he was legally blind. I believe in the right at
this point in time. How they got this pass boxing
commissions and doctors or whatever whatever tactic they used the Philippines.
Now his left eye is swelling shut with Ali blasting
him in the thirteenth round, in the fourteenth round, and
(13:14):
in Futch's interview that I remember seeing somewhere he said,
I had a blind fighter that could not see, and
I was not sending him out there again to take
more punishment and maybe get killed when he could not see.
So it's just amazing that Foreman was able. I'm sorry
that Fraser was able to hang in in a twelfth round,
(13:35):
a thirteenth round, in that sweltering situation without basically being
able to see Ali.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
As he's you know, I don't know if this was
part of Eddie Futch's reasoning for pulling Joe out of
the fight. But he was losing the fight going into
that fourteenth round, so I mean, obviously he probably had
an inkling that his guy was down. You know, if
he had been up big, maybe he lets it go
because you know, if he can take three more minutes
of punishment, he's gonna win the fight. But you know
(14:03):
it was.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Not the case.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
But I mean, they stopped the fight and they immediately
cut over to Ali and you hear the legendary play
by play man on the closed circuit Don Dumpy going,
I think they're stopping the fight, and they see Ali
stand up, and he says Ali has won the fight.
And Ali puts his arms up for a second and
then walks to the middle of the ring and sits
down and then eventually lays down in the middle of
(14:26):
the ring, just exhausted and dehydrated. He reportedly lost like
seven pounds during the fight in waterweight. It was it
was crazy what they put themselves through.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
It was, like they said, about being as near death
as one could imagine and remember going into the fight.
You know, what made it so important for the public,
for the fans is that they had the history of
the rivalry the first two fights, so obviously we're one
and one. They were both superstar heavyweight champions, had been
you know, Fraser had been the champion. They had had
(14:58):
some harsh words with each other, and you know got
into the uh the physical altercation on Wide World of
Sports for Eximp Howard. Yes, so they had had a
lot of well really not both. Then it was really
Ali that had the bad word to say about Joe Fraser,
which hurt him very deeply, even if Falley claims he
didn't really mean it that way. But you know it's
more of a promotional thing. But you know, they had
a very complicated relationship beyond the ring.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Very famously, Ali's at one of the press conferences and
pulls out a rubber toy gorilla and he starts doing
his riff of I'm gonna show you that it's going
to be a thriller when I pound the gorilla in Manila,
and he starts hitting the rubber gorilla right next to
Fraser at Fraser and Fraser's ready to fight him at
the press conference.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Exact quote TJ. It's it's going to be a thriller,
and at Chilla and at Kila when I get the
gorilla in Manila.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
And he's pounding on the rubber gorilla holding it in
his hand, right next to Fraser who's ready to fight him.
There again after they had fought in the New York
studio for ABC on Howard Cosell's show, So there was
a blood And what.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
Made it so amazing though, is that these are heavyweights
who had all time ability to take punishment, who had
gargantua and hearts, who weren't going to give an inch,
and you had to impose yourself on each other. And
that's what they did for this fight. And again, because
they weren't what they were at their best, they kind
of couldn't get out of the way and they just
(16:22):
had to rely more on their heart than on their
skills at this point of their careers.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
And again, we can't say enough the magnitude that this
is front page news worldwide that Ali has won this fight.
It's the lead story on the national news. Remember there's
no Internet, there's no real there's no cable TV, the.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
Cell phone doesn't exist.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
This was such a big deal that Ali had won
this fight on the heels of beating form in the
year before, for the legacy and for the all time. Now,
the important thing in the nostalgia is this wasn't at
the end of the career of either guy, as you
were making read Ali fought a bunch.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Yeah, I mean, in a perfect world, both these guys
probably should have called it a day when this is over.
Obviously it's boxing that wasn't gonna happen. So this was,
like I said October seventy five, Joe has taking a
very bad meeting. In this fight, he retires or you know,
Eddie Fudge pulls him out after round fourteen less than
you know. Seven eight months later June of two, June
of seventy six, he comes back and he has a rematch,
(17:19):
not for the world title, this is a regional title fight.
He has the rematch with George Foreman. Memory comes in
with the with the you know, he's wearing the rope,
but he's got the hood up and when he pulls
the hood off, shows that he's shaved his head bald.
That was kind of a shock to everybody. And George
Foreman knocked him down a couple of times and stopped
him in the fifth round. So obviously got the two
(17:39):
knockout victories, and as I mentioned, then he was pretty
much done for that time. And then that was seventy six,
and then at the end of nineteen eighty one he
came out of retirement for a singular fight against Jumbo Cummings,
fought him to a draw in a ten rounder, and
then never fought again. Now so so in essence, the
Ali third fight ended Joe's career, you know, with the
let's call it the coda of.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
The for all intents and purposes, that was the end
of it.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Now with Ali, totally different ballgames. So he's stilled the
champion because he retained the title because he you know
that he had won back from Foreman in seventy four.
He fights Frasier in the third fight in h now
the amount of punishment takes in October of nineteen seventy five.
He was back in action in February of nineteen seventy six.
I mean he took off just a few months. He
(18:23):
fought in Puerto Rico when he had a fight against
Jean Pierre Coopan, who he knocked out. So he was
very active after that. He went on and actually had
some of his biggest fights, biggest wins and a lot
of you know, added a lot.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Of Yankee Stadium in nineteen six.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Even before that, so after Coopman, he had the Jimmy
Young fight, he fought Richard Dunn in Munich. You know
you mentioned he fought all over the place. He went
to Europe for that fight. Then he had that's the
seventy six fight. This was at Yankee Stadium, the third
fight with Kenny Norton. That was a controversial decision that
Ali won to retain the title. They had split two
previous fights. Norton was always style wise of pain in
(18:58):
the neck for Ali to deal with, and he had
another big problem with him on that night in September
of seventy six and a third fight. And if you
talked to Bob Aram, who was the promoter for that
fight also, he'll tell you that it was after the
as much punishment as Ali talk against Frasier in the
Manila fight. I've talked to Bob in the past and
he said to me, after the seventy six third fight
(19:21):
with Kenny Norton, that's when he felt that Ali should
have retired because he could tell that was the night
where shruck Aram, who promoted by the way like twenty
seven of Muhammad Ali's fights. He knew him extremely well.
They were together for a long time and maintained the
relationship even long after his retirement, to the point where
now he promotes his grandson Nico Ali Walsh. In any event,
(19:41):
it was after the fight with Norton where Bob thought
that should have been the end for Muhammad, but he
was still the heavyweight champion, and of course he continued
to fight. He fought Alfredo Evangelista late in nineteen seventy seventy,
he fought Ernie Shavers again for another time in nineteen
seventy seven, and then he matched up with Leon Spinks
in February of nineteen seventy eight. Obviously, that became one
of the famous upsets of all time. Vally is the
(20:04):
long reigning champion. People maybe are blinded to think that
he's still got it because he's been on a run
of continual defenses. Spinx's uh six oh one had won
the Olympic gold medal but had a draw on his record,
And you know, if they made that kind of match today,
people would go absolutely Luna to right stunning.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
It was stunning. It was stunning that he beat him.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
And again that was an interesting time frame because I'll
y another factor here. Ali was in need of money,
and that's well known. He talked about it, he wrote
about it in his book, and so he was still fighting
frequently because of the money, and there was some money
because of the Spinks name of being an Olympic champion,
et cetera. And it's people don't realize how regularly he
(20:45):
fought after the Fraser fight before we had to Larry
Holmes coming up, but he did.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
He fought a bunch, but.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
He obviously lost that fight to Spinks, one of the
greatest upsets in boxing history. And he's certainly in the
heavyweight division. And Leon Spinks became an a you know,
as much fame and notoriety as the top amateurs had
back the time the nineteen seventy sixth ELEMIT team with
Leon Spinks, with his brother Michael Spinx, with Sugar Ray Leonard.
They became household names. But he became even bigger in
(21:09):
terms of what his profile was after he had the
split decision over Ali to win the title. And then,
of course, you know, later in nineteen seventy eight, eight
months later or whatever it was, he lost in the
giant rematch in New Orleans.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Breaking night in the Superdome. All right, So I'm going
to hit you with a little fun trivia.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
By the way, that was at that moment that seemed
to be the end of Valley, that he was going
to be done.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Right right, But how about when he fought Spinks in
the first fight to give you an idea of the
magnitude of the interest, that was a weak night in
Las Vegas, and they televised it live on CBS, CBS
bid for the fight, CBS Television. Brent Musberger called the
fight that night. At that point, Forty Pacheco, the fight doctor,
(21:52):
had decided I'm not going to be involved with Ali anymore.
I think he should retire.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
But he was on the broadcast, which is good because
Freddy Picheck was a horrible announcer.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
Well, okay, but the fight doctors there, all right.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
CBS had forty three million people watch that night, so again,
different era, fewer channels. You know, Ali was that big
of a deal. Rayfield, We've talked about this before. Do
you remember for the rematch later in September in New Orleans?
The TV audience, how many people watched the Ali Spinks
(22:25):
was like seventy million or something.
Speaker 3 (22:26):
That was why nine zero brother ninety million.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
People because people have three channels and it was a
massive that's right.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
But the magnitude of Ali trying to get the heavyweight
title back once more avenged the loss to Sphinx.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
It was on the level of a super Bowl. I mean, you.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Can't fathom that five million people will watch a fight anymore.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
In today's day. The super Bowl does like one hundred
million people, the one hundred three million, hundred forever. This
was not quite that much. And obviously it's also you know,
decades ago, so there's people in the United States at
that point. But yeah, so it did like a super
Bowl level number.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Like I mean in the present in the present day,
you would kill to get five million people to watch.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
You look up and see what did the super Bowl
broadcast in like nineteen seventy eight or nineteen.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
Oh this was more than it.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
This was more than it on a Sunday afternoon by
by far, I'm sure then the Steelers and the Cowboys or.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
But there was the game was the super Bowl back
at night?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Back then, the super Bowl was in the daytime.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
Back in the they would play it in the afternoon,
in the late afternoon, and this this was just on
a different level that win over Foreman in Africa, the
win and the Thriller Manila that we're talking about right now,
for this just launched Ali even more into the lore
and the fight fans and the magnitude of it. That
ninety million people watched the Sphinx fight and then just
(23:45):
one more time. He retired after that night, but then
came out of the retirement and the anniversary of that
fight is this week. Also right at the same time
as the Thriller in Manila, as he fought Larry Holmes
coming out of retirement.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
Yeah, that should never have happened. I mean, Holmes was
in like a no win situation. He was always in
the shadow of Ali, even though he was becoming a
great champion in his own right at that time. And
it's like in boxing, it happens on a regular basi.
It's the right of passage, it's the passing of the baton.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
You know, he had sparred with Muhammad Ali, he had
been on undercards of his and now he had to
fight him. I don't think he reveled in it. And
he's talked about it, and if you go back, you
can find any number of comments from Larry Holmes for
the years that you know he didn't want to hurt
Muhammad Ali or do any kind of damage to him,
and uh, for whatever reason, Ali took that fight. He
got absolutely destroyed.
Speaker 1 (24:34):
Money again probably and it was obvious that night because
you go back and watch that fight. Ali had nothing
like in the second round and the fight it went
on and on with Holmes just beating on him and
beating on him, and finally they stopped the fight.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Angela Dundee stopped it after the tenth round. And then
as sick as that beatdown was, a year later, you know,
Ali fought again fourteen months later. That was the fight
against ever Berbick in Nasa the Bahamas, which was ultimately
the final fight of his career. But you know, he
could have walked away after the Minila fight and that
(25:09):
would have been good. He certainly could have walked away
after regaining the title against Spinks in the rematch, but
you know, like every fighter, you know, he wanted to
keep going and make the money, like you said, and
you know they took the beatings against Holmes. He didn't
really take a beating against Burbick. He actually didn't look
that horrible against Burbick, as crazy as it sounds. But
those two fights probably should never have happened. But the
(25:31):
The Thriller in Manila, again, my opinion, took so much
out of Ali, took so much out of Frasier that
it probably that should have been. It was a great
I mean, it is an unbelievable fight. It's just mesmerizing
type of battle.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Especially when you take all the factors into account of
the scorching heat and the fact that Fraser basically could
not see in the rounds of the fight. Yeah, and
the and the hatred these two guys had for each
other all through out.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Their careers and even post careers.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
So great nostalgia here for this sharing the time on it.
It's wild that the anniversary of the two fights of
the Thrilling Manila and then Holmes destroying Leir within what
a day of each other, So it's five years apart.
Crazy crazy on that listen, great stuff. Always always love
(26:22):
doing the nostalgic thing.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
By the way, I may say also it may be
a few days between those two fights, but Ali fought
in that same time frame because the Kenny Norton fight
was on September twenty eighth, so a few days earlier.
That's the Yankee stad What's the date.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
On the Spinks revenge fight in September of seventy eight.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
It's September. That was September fifteenth.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
September fifteenth, so, and even.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
September twenty ninth of nineteen seventy seven, that was the
Ernie Shavers fight that he had defending the title. So
he was keeping to that sort of I guess, I
don't know if it was on purpose.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
The Greatest did not shy away from fighting anybody. He
fought everybody seemingly in his era, including this epic fight
with Joe Fraser.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Ask you, I mean, is there a single heavyweight of
consequence in that time frame, from like say, the late
sixties through like till like nineteen eighty ish nineteen, like
late seventies that he didn't fight. No, The answer is no.
He fought everybody, Yes, and that's one of the reason.
And he beat them.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
He beat almost all of them, even if.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
He lost to like, you know, Fraser, he certainly because.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Berbick and Holmes, the last two are the only two
he didn't avenge. He obviously avenged the Fraser loss, he
avenged the Norton loss.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
Career, he fought Holmes and Burbick. I mean not the
Burbick became a great fighter, but I would consider them
to not even really be truly of his era. They
were they were like of the next era.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yes, I would agree with that.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
And the interesting thing, and I wrote about this back
in the day when I was at ESPN when Trevor
Burke was killed, that he is the the bridge, if
you will, between the two ears, because he retired Ali
and lost the title to Tyson. Yeah, so that's the
bridge between those two great eras, those two great fighters,
and those eras of boxing.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
Great stuff on the Nostalgia Again, thank you to the
podcast audience for bearing with us on the Nostalgic podcast here,
and we pledge that as October rolls on and there's
more important and significant fight cards going on, not just
in the US but worldwide, we'll have more on that.
For now, Big Dan, thank you for the trip down
memory lane about the thrilla in Manila and the end
(28:23):
of Muhammad Ali's career in the years after that and
the fights after that.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
All good stuff with this have.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
A good week, my friend. Thank you for this again.
Soon there we go, There goes Big Dan Rayhiel, I'm
merely TJ Reeves. So thank you for finding us here
as part of the Fight Preach Unit podcast here on
this Big Fight Weekend podcast feed.
Speaker 3 (28:44):
We're back again soon enough.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
But we've been talking Thrilla and Manila nostalgia. I don't
want to accept it's fifty years on, but it's fifty
years later. It's great stuff tonight being nostalgic. Thank you
for being with us.
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