5. Muhammad Ali KO 3 Brian London – 1966
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jU2YPXghFkU
Muhammad Ali came into the bout, looking to make the 5th defence of his WBC and Lineal world heavyweight titles.
He was settling into his role, as the holder of the greatest prize in sports in the heavyweight title.
This fight came midway through his European tour. This fight sandwiched between Ali’s meeting with Henry Cooper in London and his meeting with Karl Mildenberger in Germany.
‘The Louisville Lip’ was close to his physical peak at this stage. He demonstrated his mind boggling hand speed in this fight’s conclusion.
Ali started the knockout sequence by feinting with the jab causing the hesitant London into retreat.
Once he was trapped on the ropes with nowhere to go. Ali proceeded to dispatch the Briton by annihilating him with a fusillade of sharp, blistering blows.
4. Muhammad Ali TKO 15 Oscar Bonavena – 1970
Muhammad Ali was coming off a three year hiatus from the sport. This followed his decision to refuse to be inducted into the U.S military, to serve in Vietnam.
Following that three year period. Ali returned to the sport a more heavyset fighter as he filled out as a man. He was no longer the lean, lightning quick dancer who could stay up on his toes for 15 rounds.
But still his talent was undeniable and he was on a collision course with the man who now held his title in Smokin’ Joe Frazier.
His second fight in three years came against the tried and tested Argentinian, Oscar Bonavena who famously went by the nickname ‘Ringo’.
Bonavena proved himself in a hard-fought encounter with Frazier. Bonavena even sent Frazier to the deck twice in their first meeting in 1966.
Ali and Bonavena endured a rocky promotion to their build-up with Bonavena accusing Ali of being a ‘big chicken’ for refusing to be drafted.
Ali emphatically stated in return that “Bonavena was going to get a good whooping” before adding “he had never wanted to whoop a man so bad”.
Bonavena was tough and he was game all the way. However, Ali was always remembered fondly for his exceptional stamina and workrate and down the stretch of the fight; the pace of the bout took its toll on Bonavena’s legs.
Bonavena suffered three knockdowns in the fight’s final round, resulting in the only stoppage on his 68 fight professional record.
3. Muhammad Ali KO 1 Sonny Liston – 1965
https://youtu.be/WOQ1ERnkbh4?t=7m8s
Many have questioned this knockout due to Sonny Liston’s known affiliation with the mob and other underworld connections.
Liston had always demonstrated a legendary chin in his career and dismissed flush hooks on the point of the chin against a knockout puncher like Cleveland Williams.
However, this knockout is pivotal in hindsight to the overall Muhammad Ali story. Many still hadn’t bought into what Ali represented.
Many had felt he was merely just a loudmouth. Ali also brought with him a revolutionary approach to heavyweight boxing. His style of utilising angles and ring IQ as tools to achieve victories as opposed to brute force.
But with this victory, many begrudgingly begun to accept Ali as a new type of champion. Furthermore, this was also Ali’s first fight after changing his name from Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr to Muhammad Ali.
Ali famously referred to this knockout as the ‘phantom punch’ because of the speed of the knockout blow.
2. Muhammad Ali TKO 3 Cleveland Williams – 1966
This performance is fondly recalled as the night when Muhammad Ali was at his physical peak, he was graceful, sharp, fast and dangerous.
Cleveland Williams was a formidable puncher. ‘The Big Cat’ had garnered a reputation for being quite a knockout artist but on this night against Ali; Williams had become a slow, plodding target.
It was almost as if Cleveland Williams was a bobble-head doll in this fight given the amount of times his head was snapped backwards and forwards.
Ali was at his physical and mental peak that night in the Houston Astrodome. In many ways this didn’t have the concussive punching typical of the heavyweight division.
But, nevertheless, in many ways this was one of the most devastating stoppages in heavyweight title fight history.
1. Muhammad Ali KO 8 George Foreman – 1974
This was Muhammad Ali’s masterpiece. Many dismissed his chances as pure stupidity going into this fight; many inside Ali’s circle feared for his life going into this match-up.
George Foreman was seen as the most formidable puncher to grace the heavyweight division.
He was seen as a throwback to the days of Joe Louis and Rocky Marciano. In the sense, that he looked to end the fight spectacularly with every blow.
Foreman had done away with adversaries such as Ken Norton and Joe Frazier, with relative ease inside of two rounds.
Norton and Frazier were both opponents who had given Ali the fights of his career, furthermore they both held wins over the self-proclaimed ‘Greatest Of All Times’.
Furthermore, Ali’s speed which had once been such an important tool in his ring artistry had seemed to forsake him.
Ali was now a much bigger, fully grown man who got hit with a lot more punches than he once did.
The combatants collided on October 30th, 1974 in Kinshasa, Zaire. Foreman came out with his usual all out aggression style of fighting.
Foreman dished out an almost insurmountable amount of punishment to the body of Ali.
However what nobody knew was that Ali was deploying a tactic he had devised. This was coined as the ‘Rope-a-Dope’, it involved Ali trying to deceptively encourage Foreman into punching himself out.
Ali believed that his opponent’s style of fighting could not be sustained over 15 rounds.
In the eighth round, sensing his foe was slowing down turned up the heat and pressed for the fights end.
Ali came off the ropes and unloaded a fusillade of sharp blows which led to his becoming only the second man in boxing history to win back the world heavyweight championship.
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