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The toughest part was watching, watching while knowing full well the slow death unfolding on the television screen, almost 25 years ago. Hindsight in this case, so brutal, poignant, and yet...and yet...he thrilled me, took my breath away, made me leap out of my seat and cry out with joy... Again.

Maybe it was the sights for the fights. At the time, to a kid in elementary school, they seemed exotic, faraway lands, where lions and tigers and natives danced around a huge iron pit full of unlucky travelers. Africa, and then the Philippines, which might as well have been Africa to an American kid raised on stereotypical versions of the Other. Looking back now, having waded through Mailer’s diary on The Fight, I understand the political significance of the Foreman-Ali match, the "Rumble in the Jungle" event in Zaire (which is back to Congo status, says the latest map). In 1975. Blacks, kings of the sport, fighting in the land of their ancients, a triumphant return to the homeland, the power rested with the black man, as the white man trailed along behind with camera and hat in hand.

Maybe it was that I could finally comprehend why the male figures in my family did their damnedest to shake free my love of Ali from me, constantly badgering me, belittling me, shaking their heads at me because I had, of all unacceptable things, Ali as my hero. They railed against his big mouth, his arrogance, his flouting of the rules of the game, The Game. And they were scared of him, I know now. Scared of a big, handsome black man knocking the shit out of them, their rules and their conceptions. Wow. Heavy stuff.

The man had this uncanny knack for finding the deepest reserve of strength and energy, a half hour after you would swear he was doomed to die on that very night, in that very 20-by-20-foot grave. But, here, in the 14th round against Joe Frazier, more viewers than ever before watching, watching the "Thrilla in Manila," here, was Ali, 33 was Ali, raining blows onto Frazier’s lumpy, bulging cranium like drumbeats, pop-pop-pop, rat-a-tat-tat, dink-dink-dink....from the brink of exhaustion, time and time again, this beautiful physical thing, this, I don't know, this genius of flesh, bone and sound byte, stood, threw and connected, through the agony of limbs and legs long since drained of juice. He tossed combinations, popping Frazier’s skull like fingers drumming on a table. Never was the style more apparent than in these moments of extreme weariness. Later, Ali would say that never had he been so close to death than on this sweltering summer night. But never was he more impressive, never was he more, well, more ALI. Leaning back on dead legs, head hanging down, gloves up and pawing for Frazier’s meaty head like a blind man feels for the railing.

The look on his facetold me that he was probably too tired to cry, too weak to stop... Frazier, poor wonderful Frazier, he of the one speed: forward, and the stumpy, short body and the left hook that came from a neighborhood away,poor Frazier, his head always betrayed him, because, power, pride and desire aside, it always came first. He led with his head and against Ali this time, he was dead. The head met the glove, time and time again inthat 14th round, where Ali summoned once again his superhuman side and got up off the canvas in his mind to splash punches all over Frazier’s face. He staggered him once, and that’s like staggering a building. Hisjab flicking in and out like a cobra, the long graceful arms forgetting that the legs had departed an hour ago, the face all of a sudden contorted slightly in that manner Ali assumed when he knew he was on tosomething...he would wrinkle up his nose and when his punch hit you could hear him going "unnhh" like he was saying, "Take this, sucker," and he was unbeatable. He ticked off eight straight at one point, landing every one of them and the crowd reached orgasm for the 50th time that night.

Just when Ali seemed to die, he lived, waiting for Frazier’s valiant and foolish charge, sitting on the ropes gasping for one last breath and then, as the Philadelphia wave receded ever so slightly, the Louisville Lip gave it some parting gifts, take that with you, chump. Pop-pop-pop, off the ropes and into history, now dancing to the delight of the people, this People’s Champ, now standing toe-to-toe, which he wasn’t supposed to do, said the advisers, now backing off. Never has an athlete had such a rhythm in the face of such fatigue.

And someone once told me that it never looked like the man was hurting anyone, with that pat-a-cake punch, with punches that looked like he was throwing a frisbee at the guy. So I said to the guy, then why is Frazier’s face all swole? Right on. Effortless, that was what he was, he did it easy...and when he got tired, he just dug down deep and found some more greatness.

I can only compare it to that No. 23 fellow, the tall one, who left the world of basketball on cue this summer. Check the clock, give the ball to Michael and just have fun watching. Hold the round card up, tell Ali it’s time to dance, and get out of the way. And Ali never really listened, did he? And that made him ever greater somehow.

I felt sorry for Frazier as this replay reached its completion. He had the heart of a lion, that man. But he couldn’t touch Ali. Even though he did knock the Champ on his ass in ‘71 to win the first of their three fights, it doesn’t matter. Ali was bigger than boxing, a counterculture soul star who made love, not war, with a shabby nation of young people and blacks desperately seeking someone who would say, fuck the system and the horse it rode in on. And he was the only guy I ever saw who could win even when he lost.

It was like, if Ali didn’t act like he lost, no one did either. That ‘71 thing, a fluke, and how dare Frazier DO a thing like that, messing with history, with destiny, with theater?

But, then it hit me, as I watched Frazier, spent and sagging, face swollen beyond recognition, and then saw his trainer, Eddie Futch, throw in the towel. There would not be a 15th round. Ali, floating not like a butterfly but like a corpse in a lake, facedown, could barely stand to take his place as the victor. When there was no clowning, boasting or even any emotion after we were all sure that Frazier, courageous Frazier, was at last no more, then I knew. Like I knew soon after the fight in 1975, I knew now watching this cable television replay. And this time it was even more obvious.

I thought I saw a ghost, slight and silvery, subtle and soft, leave Ali’s body that night in the ring. And without going into painful detail about the next 24 years, I know I saw it. Even if the man had never climbed into the ring again, save as a guest of honor at someone’s else’s boxing bloodbath and funeral, a part of him died that night that would never live again.

So, once again, he thrilled me. He filled me with the extreme emotion. Joy, wonder, elation and sorrow. Was it worth it? He cannot tell us. Perhaps we must look inward for that one.

Legend records that Frazier passed the next six weeks in a hospital. It doesn’t record one monumental death on the same canvas that night.

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