Hey Joe
While Holmes and Foreman prosper, the great Smokin’ Joe Frazier is boxing history’s forgotten legend, never forgiven for his 1971 victory over Ali.
Eamonn McCann, 13 Apr 2007
The most popular tourist spot in Philadelphia is the plaza in front of the Arts Museum where the statue of Rocky Balboa stands, gloved fists raised to the heavens.
Every day, visitors who fancy they’re fit try to sprint up the 72 steps (“The most famous steps in America,” according to the Guardian) to have a picture taken at the plinth. I wonder what Joe Frazier makes of it all.
Pictures of Smokin’ Joe greeting John Duddy following his victory over Anthony Bonsante at Madison Square Garden in the early hours of St. Patrick’s Day testified to the Derry middleweight’s growing reputation in the States. But the images served, too, as a reminder of the injustice which has long been inflicted on Frazier.
The fact that Rocky VI had been showing in the Strand Multiplex the previous week gave Frazier’s attendance at the Derryman’s fight an additional piquancy.
Frazier’s greatness as a fighter has become dimmed in the mass memory over the last 30 years. In part at least, this has arisen from his fearsome rivalry and subsequent feud with Muhammed Ali. Some have never forgiven him for out-pointing Ali to retain his title at the Garden’s main arena in 1971. The perfect script had demanded that hitherto unbeaten Ali reclaim the crown which bigots had stripped from him for refusing to be drafted into the war on Vietnam. It seemed to the millions who felt somehow cheated that this thwarting of fate had been contrived out of spite against history. Frazier had rained on the perfect parade which they’d planned.
But that doesn’t entirely explain why Ali’s other major rivals, George Foreman and Larry Holmes, remain popular celebrities and are comfortably off, while Frazier lives alone in a one-bedroom apartment above a gym in the same run-down area of Philly where he spent his teenage years and where he still helps train young fighters. He is by no means a derelict and shows no sign of self-pity. But he could accurately be described as down on his luck.
Page 1/4 <Previous 1 2 3 4 Next>
©Hot Press 2012. Why be a member? | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | About Us Jobs @ Hot Press