Why, Chump, I bet you scare yourself to death just starin' in the mirror. You ugly bear!
You ain't never fought nobody but tramps and has beens. You call yourself a world
champion? You're too old and slow to be champion!
To Sonny Liston before their fight on 25 February 1964

I shook up the world! I shook up the world!
After beating Liston

"Floats like a butterfly, sting like a bee, his hands can't hit what his eyes can't see."
Before the 1974 fight against George Foreman

"I'm not the greatest; I'm the double greatest. Not only do I knock 'em out, I pick the
round."

"I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning,
thrown thunder in jail; only last week, I murdered a rock, injured a stone,
hospitalised a brick; I'm so mean I make medicine sick."
Again, before the 1974 Foreman fight

"I'm so fast that last night I turned off the light switch in my hotel room and got into bed
before the room was dark."
Yet more '74 pre-fight build-up ahead of facing Foreman

"That all you got George?"
To Foreman late in the Rumble in the Jungle in Zaire on 30 October 1974

"I never thought of losing, but now that it's happened, the only thing is to do it right.
That's my obligation to all the people who believe in me. We all have to take defeats in
life."
After losing to Ken Norton, 31 March 1973

"What's my name, fool? What's my name?"
To Ernie Terrell during their 1967 fight - Terrell had refused to call him Muhammad Ali

Ali vs Frazier" Frazier is so ugly that he should donate his face to the US Bureau of Wildlife. Ali
Joe Frazier is so ugly that when he cries, the tears turn around
and go down the back of his head.
Ali

"It will be a killer, and a chiller, and a thriller, when I get the gorilla in Manila"
Ali, before the "Thrilla in Manila"

"I always bring out the best in men I fight, but Joe Frazier, I'll tell the world right now,
brings out the best in me. I'm gonna tell ya, that's one helluva man, and God bless him."
Ali, after the "Thrilla in Manila"

Ali about Frazier "I said a lot of things in the heat of the moment that I shouldn't have said. Called him
names I shouldn't have called him. I apologise for that. I'm sorry. It was all meant to
promote the fight."

Frazier in reflective mood.
"The Butterfly (Ali) and me have been through some ups and downs and there have been
lots of emotions, many of them bad. But I have forgiven him. I had to. You cannot hold
out for ever. There were bruises in my heart because of the words he used. I spent years
dreaming about him and wanting to hurt him. But you have got to throw that stick out of the window. Do not forget that we needed each other, to produce some of the greatest
fights of all time."

Muhammad Ali on Boxing
"When you can whip any man in the world, you never know peace."

"Boxing is a lot of white men watching two black men beat each other up."

"Champions aren't made in gyms, champions are made from something they have deep
inside them - a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina,
they have to be
a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill."

Accomplishments
1959 National Golden Gloves Light Heavyweight Champion
1959 National Amateur Athletic Union champion
1960 National Golden Gloves Light Heavyweight Champion
1960 National Amateur Athletic Union champion
1960 Gold medal, Rome Olympics, light-heavyweight boxing
1964-67 World Heavyweight Champion
1970 Dr. Martin Luther King Memorial Award
1974 Sportsman of the Year, Sports Illustrated
1974 Fighter of the Year, Boxing Writers Association
1974-78 World Heavyweight Champion
1978-79 World Heavyweight Champion
1979 Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters, Texas Southern Univesity
1979 Street named after him in Louisville, Kentucky
1985 Recognized for long, meritorious service, World Boxing Association
1987 Elected to Boxing Hall of Fame
1990 Inducted into International Boxing Hall of Fame
1996 Lights Olympic torch, Atlanta
1997 Arthur Ashe Award for Courage, ESPN
1997 Essence Living Legend Award