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Muhammad Ali, the last man to make sports matter, dies

Last updated on 06/04/2016

The NYT has the news here:

… But he was more than the sum of his athletic gifts. An agile mind, a buoyant personality, a brash self-confidence and an evolving set of personal convictions fostered a magnetism that the ring alone could not contain. He entertained as much with his mouth as with his fists, narrating his life with a patter of inventive doggerel. (“Me! Wheeeeee!”)

Ali was as polarizing a superstar as the sports world has ever produced — both admired and vilified in the 1960s and ’70s for his religious, political and social stances. His refusal to be drafted during the Vietnam War, his rejection of racial integration at the height of the civil rights movement, his conversion from Christianity to Islam and the changing of his “slave” name, Cassius Clay, to one bestowed by the separatist black sect he joined, the Lost-Found Nation of Islam, were perceived as serious threats by the conservative establishment and noble acts of defiance by the liberal opposition.

Every now and then someone asks me why I despise UO basketball coach Dana Altman. It’s because he tries so hard to make sports not matter:

12/10/2014: Coach Dana Altman thinks National Anthem is the wrong time to protest racism

Our fool of a basketball coach thinks he owns those players. They shouldn’t protest when he’s trying to collect his $2M paycheck, off their free labor.

Fortunately we’ve still got people who can hear someone sing “O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave” and actually understand what it means.

Want to ask the players what they think? No. Duck AD Rob Mullens and his PR flack Craig Pintens have a rule about players talking to reporters without permission, and “Benjamin and Bell have not been made available to comment.”

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12 Comments

  1. LJE 06/04/2016

    I met him in the seventies when I worked for ABC Sports. I was a lone young woman in a man’s world. He singled me out and called me out as “sister” even though I was (and am) very white. He was the champion and I was 19 years old, but for a brief moment we were allies. Bless his memory and may angels raise him to his rest.

  2. Dog 06/04/2016

    while Ali was controversial, flippant and cocky on the outside on the inside he was a very committed person on a variety of issues. Never forget, that, as Cassius Clay, he was a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War – that takes real courage and commitment

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clay_v._United_States (and this does seem detailed and accurate)

    and while I disagree with UOmatters that Ali was the “last man” to make sports matter – I do think that Ali almost single handedly launched self-promotion and globalization of sport that has turned it in to a huge commercial success … it is, of course, unclear if this is a net good or net evil on the sports enterprise but it is, what it is … sting like a bee, forever

  3. Licensed in Oregon 06/04/2016

    Your comments about Dana Altman are false and defamatory. He has worked very hard to make sports matter, for his own paycheck. Speaking of which his contract is up for renegotiation this year, and you can expect to pay him still more.

    • uomatters 06/04/2016

      30 pieces of silver is the going rate. Do you think Coach Altman deserves more?

        • Fishwrapper 06/06/2016

          I would sensibly assume, through application of logic and fairness to the equation, that profit is used to reimburse the academic side for subsidies to athlete-only activities/services (see: Jock Box Subsidies.

          Of course, sensible doesn’t enter in to any equation on the athletics side, so…

  4. Billie Jean King 06/06/2016

    “the last man to make sports matter”
    Man.

    • uomatters Post author | 06/06/2016

      Ouch. Guilty. Good thing my Mom doesn’t know I wrote that. My Dad either, for that matter.

    • Fishwrapper 06/06/2016

      To be fair, there have been plenty of women who have been doing an admirable job of making sports matter. Take US Soccer, for example – the women have been kicking ass while the men barely find the grass, and they are changing the game on the field, and now in the courtroom.

      Yes, Ali was the last man to make sports matter. Men no longer claim the frontiers of sport.

      Just the money.

      • Dog 06/07/2016

        Well shit, I guess I have some time now to bitch a bit in this forum – imagine that.

        No Ali was not the last man or last woman or even the last dog to matter – indeed check out Dock Jumping Dog – that’s impressive.

        Ali started self-promotion and marketing on the eve of globalization. Michael Jordan obviously too this a notch higher as did Tiger Woods and Serena Williams and there are many others.

        But why does sports matter ?(oh I don’t know, ask the 1980 US Olympic Hockey team, or ask gymnast Mary Lou Retton, or ask
        Bob Beamon, and scores of others …)

        Magic Johnson was once interviewed by someone in a general life context. This is what he said:

        In my house I have a VCR located with each TV (obviously this was a long time ago -some readers of this forum may now even know VCR) and every time I get down or feel depressed I pop the tape in which shows me playing center in Game 6 against the Celtics (since Kareem was injured) and I transcended my self during that game and played better than I thought was possible and no one can ever take that away from me.

        Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, and riches take wings. Only one thing endures and that is character.

        Sports is the one arena where the individual has a chance to transcend previous boundaries and limitations – this rarely happens but when it does, it needs to be celebrated as one of life’s great moments.

        This is why sports matter !

        • New Year Cat 06/08/2016

          Sports is not the “one” arena where we can transcend. It shares that characteristic with music and art.

          • Dog 06/08/2016

            agreed

            I was more here referring to physical transcendence

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