Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier fought one of the most dramatic and brutal fights in boxing history in 1975. At times, both fighters were in mortal danger.
Fifty years ago today, boxing stars Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier delivered one of the most brutal fights in history, creating the legendary “Thrilla in Manila.”
The sun was beating down. The temperature inside the Araneta Coliseum was around 40 degrees Celsius, and the humidity was unbearable. Just sitting there caused beads of sweat to form on the foreheads of the 25,000 spectators. These were not conditions conducive to sports, let alone top-level sports. But two men pulled themselves together that morning on October 1, 1975.
Ali loses – and regains the title
The trade magazine The Ring later wrote about “the best boxing match of the 20th century.” Ali won this match when it was stopped before the final 15th round.
The heavyweight world championship duel was the conclusion of a trilogy. The two rivals had already beaten each other up twice in the ring before that. In 1971, they fought for the title in the “Fight of the Century.” Frazier won the fight at Madison Square Garden in New York by points.
Three years later, the rematch took place. Again in New York. Again in the venerable hall in Manhattan. Only this time, the result was different. Ali won the “Super Fight II,” which wasn’t so super after all. This earned him the right to a duel with George Foreman, who was world champion at the time. Ali beat him in the “Rumble in the Jungle” and regained the titles.
And “The Greatest” thus created the conditions for another duel with Frazier. On October 1, 1975, they fought for the world championship in Manila.
Ali mocks Frazier as a gorilla
The opponents had already been trading verbal barbs beforehand. Ali mocked Frazier as a gorilla. “Are endangered animals allowed to enter the Philippines?” he asked rhetorically. But “Smokin’ Joe” was also able to dish it out. His martial words were: “I’m going to rip this half-breed’s heart out of his chest.”
Such attention-grabbing attacks were to the liking of the puppet master behind the “Thrilla”: The resourceful and shady boxing promoter Don King had chosen Quezon City in the Manila metropolitan area as the venue. King had negotiated a deal with Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos. The president and his wife Imelda were sitting in the box when the fight began at 10 a.m. Viewers in the US were able to watch the third installment of the Ali-Frazier saga during prime time.
Trainer Dundee reprimands Ali
The champion, now 33 years old, no longer possessed the elegance of earlier days. However, Ali impressed from the start with his punching power. With a left uppercut, he sent Frazier, two years his junior, into the ropes in the very first round. But the man who had been hit soon struck back. Frazier put Ali in trouble, ramming his fists into his kidneys. Angelo Dundee, Ali’s trainer, didn’t like that. “Get out of your damn corner,” he yelled in the fifth round.
Now the fight was turning into a real “Thrilla in Manila.” Ali had coined this name in advance with a rhyme: “It’s gonna be a thrilla, and a chilla, and a killa, when I get the gorilla, in Manila.”
Frazier can hardly see anything anymore
The two fighters opened the seventh round with an exchange of words. This is how the renowned sports journalist Hartmut Scherzer later wrote it up for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. “Old Joe Frazier, why did I ever think you were washed up?” Ali began the verbal duel.
His rival countered: “You’ve been misinformed, pretty boy.”
And so it continued. In the 13th round, Ali brought his opponent to the brink of a knockout with heavy blows. Frazier’s right eye swelled up afterwards, and he could hardly see anything.
Frazier’s trainer Futch calls for the fight to be stopped
After the 14th round, the challenger sat down on his stool. Frazier’s trainer Eddie Futch announced that he was stopping the fight. The boxer protested – in vain.
Ali had no strength left to celebrate his victory. He even collapsed. A sign of the inhumane conditions in the Araneta Coliseum. According to ring doctor Ferdie Pacheco, both boxers were at times in mortal danger due to their loss of fluids. When the boxers were fit again, they made statements that also went down in sporting history. “I hit him with punches that would have brought down a city wall, and he took them,” Frazier said of Ali. And the world champion was marked. Ali: “We came to Manila as young champions and left as old men.”