Manny Pacquiao was crying. For perhaps the first time in his boxing career, he was afraid. I held his face firmly with both hands and told him, ?You can?t let Oscar de la Hoya see the fear in your eyes! You?ve trained hard for this and you can do it!? As he calmed down, I started running towards the fight arena shouting, ?The champion of the world is coming!?
Of course, it was all just a dream. But I woke up thinking how it all felt so real. In any case, I hope it?s a good omen for the Pacman. I guess we will find out soon enough on Dec. 7 (Manila time).
I?m not sure if boxing is exactly a sport that so-called modern-day dads are supposed to watch with their younger kids. I must confess, however, that I was a big boxing fan when I was a boy. It was a passion I shared with my late father. Even though he was a highly religious man, my father loved watching boxing. At times, he felt guilty enjoying such a bloody sport. He could not help it though. As brutal as it was, he also called it an intelligent sport ? a science or so, he would philosophize. And when he talked of the ?sweet science? of a great fight, his eyes would narrow as if he himself were ducking the blows and counter-blows that he verbally and even physically recounted. Big fights would normally be aired via satellite on television during lunchtime. On some of those occasions, he would be glued to the screen, eating kamayan (bare-handed), as he watched.
I no longer have the same interest for boxing as I once had, which is probably better for my kids. But if there?s one thing that I would want them to learn from boxing, it?s the way my boyhood idol, Muhammad Ali ? the greatest heavyweight champion of all time ? took and rolled with the punches he received outside the ring as well as those inside it.
While championship belts nowadays have been cheapened by the proliferation of titles and the sometimes frivolous ways they are awarded, Ali remains the only man to have won the ?linear heavyweight championship three times (the linear title is recognized by tracing an almost unbroken lineage of titleholders going back over 100 years, with nearly every champion defeating the previous titleholder in the ring).?
In his first incarnation into the professional boxing world in 1960, Ali was an ?unhittable? physical marvel. Big, brash, charismatic, handsome, and strong, he was also incredibly fast for a man of his size. Known then by his Christian name, Cassius Clay, he was the prototype of the modern athlete that would manifest itself later on in the Michael Jordans of the sporting world. It seemed that he was unbeatable. But when he refused to be inducted into the US army and fight in Vietnam because of his newfound Islamic beliefs, he was convicted, stripped of his title, and banned from boxing in 1967. As brilliant a boxer as he already was by then, one of the greatest tragedies in boxing is that we never really saw Ali at his peak. Shunned like a leper by the establishment, everyone would have understood had he given up boxing in bitterness. Yet, he continued to fight for his rights and supported himself by giving speeches in various universities and colleges around the US. As public opinion turned against the Vietnam War, his conviction was eventually overturned by the Supreme Court and he was allowed to fight again in 1970.
When he returned to the ring after three years, Ali was no longer as invincible as he once was. Exile had robbed him of what would have been his best years as a fighter. He was already half a step slower and his new rivals, like ?Smoking? Joe Frazier, were tougher and stronger than ever. And so, he reinvented himself. From being difficult to hit, he actually at times allowed himself to get hit. He took all their punches and showed that he had a granite chin and an even more unbreakable heart. In the ?Rumble in the Jungle? in Africa, he took on the monstrous George Foreman, who many say hits much harder than Mike Tyson. Norman Mailer described the relentless blows that Foreman rained on Ali for almost eight rounds as reminiscent of the great artillery bombardments of World War I. Using the now famous ?rope-a-dope,? Ali hunkered down in a foxhole in between the ropes and somehow survived. He eventually knocked out Foreman to regain his crown in one the biggest upsets in boxing history.
Ali then met Joe Frazier in what many believe was the greatest fight of all time ? the ?Thrilla in Manila.? Ali had lost to Frazier in his first bid to win back the crown after his return. He subsequently beat Frazier in a rematch and then went on to take the crown from Foreman. This fight was to be the final saga of their epic trilogy. I was at the Big Dome to witness the fight that day and I can still remember it as if it was only yesterday. They battled like rabid dogs. Ali said, ?It was like death. Closest thing to dying that I know of.? The gallant Joe Frazier was practically blind in the 14th round yet he kept on punching, by then guided only by Ali?s ?man-smell? (as Teddy Benigno so eloquently wrote). His trainer mercifully threw in the towel before the start of the 15th round. When he saw that Frazier was finished, Ali himself collapsed to the floor in exhaustion. Frazier later said from his hospital bed, ?Man, I hit him with punches that?d bring down the walls of a city. Lawdy, Lawdy, he?s a great champion.?
Perhaps partly as a result of all the punishment he took in the ring, Ali developed Parkinson?s disease after he retired in 1981. As it did during the Vietnam War, fate would cruelly rob him again of his magnificent physical attributes. He lost not just his gift of jab but his gift of gab as well. He soon moved as if in perpetual slow motion and his hands constantly trembled. His speech slurred so much he hardly spoke at all. It seemed like a tragedy of Greek proportions. Many pitied him.
And yet, in perhaps his greatest triumph ever, he refused to let his sickness knock him out. With seemingly no self-consciousness or self-pity at all, he embraced his affliction. Despite his illness, he has remained one of the most active and beloved public figures ? raising funds for the Muhammad Ali Foundation, lending his name to various worthwhile causes, and frequently appearing at various sports tributes and fund-raisers. His wife Lonnie said, ?Muhammad knows he has this illness for a reason. It?s not by chance. Parkinson?s disease has made him a more spiritual person. Muhammad believes God gave it to him to bring him to another level, to create another destiny.?
More than the fame and the fortune, it is Ali?s ability to adapt and courageously transform himself amid all the curveballs that life threw at him that I hope my children can learn from.
My most enduring image of Ali was imprinted in my mind during the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. As the last Olympic torch relay runner ran up the stadium steps, the whole world held its breath in excitement to find out which athlete would be given the honor of lighting the Olympic flame. An estimated 3.5 billion people gasped in surprise as they saw Muhammad Ali slowly emerge from the shadows. His hands shook violently because of his ailment and the billions watching feared that he might drop the torch. But with cool and steely resolve, he ignited the flame and then held the torch over his head in victory. Gary Smith of Sports Illustrated was right. People say that Ali was the greatest heavyweight champion of all time. Look again. He still is.
As for the Pacman, I have one last piece of advice for him from Muhammad Ali: Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.
Your hands can?t hit what your eyes can?t see.
Rumble young man, rumble. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!
