♪ >> we are covering the death of the champ, announced tonight, surrounded by his family in arizona. the end of the journey for muhammad ali. death came at the age of 74. for a man who as we've been saying, could not go anywhere in the world in his adult lifetime without people knowing his name. he called himself the greatest, and his work, his deeds, eventually made that title come true. he called himself the king of the world and eventually his work in the ring and his

largeness as a human made that title come true. born cassius clay. known to the world as muhammad ali. what an american journey for the man who was easily the most famous man in the world for decades at a time. and a singular sports star. we haven't really seen the likes of and may not for a long time to come. as we said, death came earlier this evening. a lot of journalists are reacting to this. here is robert lipsight in the "new york times," muhammad ali, the three-time world heavyweight boxing championship, who helped define his turbulent times as the most charismatic and controversial sports figure of the 20th century, died on friday. he was 74 years old. as i was saying earlier this evening, our friend matt lauer

had the great luck and good fortune in life to have been a friend of muhammad ali, and remained a friend later in life. matt was close as well to members of the ali extended family. and tonight, for us, matt lauer has a look back. >> i'm the king of the world! >> hold it, hold it. >> i'm pretty. >> you're not that pretty. >> i'm a bad man. >> reporter: he called himself the greatest. he was both adored and scorned. >> he had a lot of threats against him. >> reporter: but with superior skill and a unique sty of boxing -- >> i float like a butterfly and sting like eye bee. >> reporter: -- moment ali became a cultural icon. >> i'm so great. i'm so great. >> angelo dundee, ali's trainer and corner man for over 21 years, passed away from 2012. but was with ali during some of his most memorable fights. >> we had to put a mike in his

puss. he was sensational. he was so good, muhammad. >> reporter: he was born cassius clay on january 17, 1942, in louisville kentucky. when he was 12 years old, his bicycle was stolen. he was so angry that he vowed to whoop whoever stole it. that determination propelled klay to win two national golden glove titles and qualify are if the u.s. team at the 1960 olympics in rome. >> i met cassius in 1958. he told me he was going to win the olympics. he won the olympics in '60. >> reporter: clay wore his gold medal for two days straight. throw he would later throw it into the ohio river, disillusioned by his second class treatment when he returned home. he began his professional boxing career, his first big test was against heavyweight champion sonny liston. it was also the first time many would hear clay's effortless

ability to compose a rhyme. >> if you like to lose your money, then be a fool and bet on sonny. >> lifton was heavily favored, but in the end, clay proved prophetic. >> that might be all. >> reporter: at 22 years old, clay became the youngest heavyweight champion. >> i still got the world! i still got the world! >> reporter: he quickly shook up the world again, by announcing he had joined the nation of islam and changed list name. >> cassius clay was my slave name. i'm no longer a slave. >> reporter: his declaration became a lightning rod, with many refusing to acknowledge his new name. but howard cosell, a rising sports caster fiercely defended ali's decision, saying they wanted another joe louis, a white man's black man. instead, they got ali, a man who would not con form, regardless of the consequences. at the height of the vietnam war, ali refused to serve,

declaring himself a conscientious actor and famously saying, i ain't got no quarrel with them vietcong. >> this is his choice, and you know, every man has a choice for his own religion and beliefs. >> reporter: convicted of draft eamptivation, he was stripped of his heavyweight title and banned from boxing. >> muhammad teaches us -- >> reporter: for the next three years, he traveled around the country, preaching the principles of islam and speaking out on race relations. >> we black people in america are fighting the same common enemy. >> reporter: in 19 sencht, his conviction was overturned, and ali, now 30 years old, was allowed back into the ring. >> who do y'all think the champ is? >> ali! >> reporter: with a couple of wins under his belt, his next opponent, kuncht heavyweight champion joe frazier. >> an explosion to the joe and muhammad ali goes down. >> reporter: ali suffers his first professional defeat. determined to reclaim the title, he trains harder than ever, and

epic fights soon followed. in zaire, the rumble in the jungle. ali wins the title back. then the thriller in manila. the third and fim fight with frazier. >> this is muhammad ali at his very best. >> ali would become boxing's first three-time heavyweight champion. in 1981, with 56 wins and only five losses, he retires at the age of 39. his agility and speech pattern now noticeably different. >> didn't realize how scientific and quick it was. >> reporter: just three years after retiring, ali was diagnosed with parkinson's. and for the rest of his life, that disease would affect his movements and eventually silence his voice. >> i believe all of you remember muhammad's pre-parkinson's days, when he moved millions with his

vibrant voice and his poetic expression. >> the greatest. >> reporter: his surprise appearance at the 1996 olympics would move the world once again. >> oh, my! >> reporter: 3.5 billion people watched as the champ delivered another great moment. >> this was a moment where the whole world was saying, thank you. [ cheers and applause ] >> reporter: ali was married four times, including current wife lonnie, his partner for more than 25 years. he also had nine children, seven daughters and two sons. all of them he called a gift from god. ali wrote that he liked to be remembered as a man who tried to be a good father, who stood up for his beliefs. muhammad ali, the greatest. >> those of you who

generationally may be new to the life and times and legacy of muhammad ali are going to hear that term a lot over these next few days, the greatest. believe those of us who were there then, who watched it all and hopefully this is part tutorial, you'll learn over the next few days why that title is appropriate and right and real and perfect. knowing about muhammad ali, being a fan of muhammad ali, being kind of enthralled by him is what people in the world had in common for generations in this country. our thoughts also turn to the current president of the united states, how he would sum up the life of muhammad ali, what ali meant to him. say nothing of the other living former presidents of the united states.

every one who, again, came up during that era, he was the subject of great fascination. dave ziron remains with us. dav dave, kind of nicely left out of that affectionate look back by matt lauer, again one of the subjects that will come up is, very few people in life know how and when to leave the stage perfectly. >> right. >> and one of the nicks on the reputation of muhammad ali was his departure from the sport. it wasn't all at once. it was gradual. there were some embarrassments and then after that came the physical degradation. >> and this is part of the ali legend, about what he sacrificed, and who he was. because there really are two muhammad alis in terms of boxing. there's the ali before 1967 when he was suspended for standing up

to the draft and saying he would not go to war. he had no quarrel with them vietcong as he said. then there was the ali who came back three years later. what happened in that intermediate period? we discussed it, but it's worth saying, the ali before 1967, his plan was to retire at 30 years old, rich, pretty, the best of all time. and yet that wasn't the plan. and so before 1967, though, his amazing ability was, he was never hit. it was actually fought in boxing, it's hard to believe, until 1967, it was thought he didn't have a good chin. it was thought he couldn't take a punch, because he never had to, because he was so fast. a full boxing match where he would be hit eight times in ten rounds. it was unbelievable. then when he came back, he was in financial duress. he needed to come back and box. he was as bob puts it so well,

addicted to the warm. in other words, he missed the glow of the crowd, the affection, the love. but at the same time, it also was because he had to come back and fight after that three-year lay-off. when he came back, he found to his own surprise, that he had a jaw made of granite, maybe the best jaw in the history of boxing and maybe he didn't have his speed, but he could do the rope-a-dope, he could take punches. you could tire yourself out punching him and he would still eight on his feet and of course he paid a horrific price for that over the next decades of his life. but even though he did lose that power of speech, my goodness, you talk to people who are close to him, as i have, and you would not meet a more serene, more happy person. and that's the part about it which i think for all of us is that he was always at peace inside his own body. he sent out a tweet about a year ago, i think it was october 2014, where he said, i wish people of the world loved each other as much as they loved me.

and that's kind of the lesson i'm thinking about in my own head. just how to -- there's never been anybody this country has ever produced that i can think of, who was as comfortable in their own skin as muhammad ali. >> absolutely. and mike, you forget the dual cruelty of a man who was so physically beautiful and verbally beautiful. his 6'3" frame, and if memory serves, 78-inch reach, stooped in the end by disease. his fluid tongue, he was the father of trash-talk, the father of sports poetry. all at the same time. both of them were faded by time and illness. >> i was listening to dave talk about it, and for all the punishment he inflicted on opponents, his defining moment really became the thriller in

manila and the punishment he took that night. i was telling you earlier, i went back and read mark cram's amazing piece about that fight in "sports illustrated" where he goes and he sits with frazier in a darkened room, after the fight that night, and frazier said to cram, i hit him with punches that would have knocked down the walls of a city. and then he said, lordy, lordy, lordy, what a champion. and ali, after that fight said, that was as close to dying as i've ever been. >> we hope that among our viewers, again this news having come in tonight of the death of the champ, muhammad ali, at the age of 74, we hope our viewers include good old-fashioned boxing fans and those joining us will appreciate our next guest. larry merchant, a hall of fame boxing commentator, the mention of his name just thrilled mike lubicka. i can tell you that, because i'm sitting next to him.

larry is with us. and if you were a boxing fan, if you watched it, especially hbo's coverage, it was like you had a dedicated corner man explaining to you what was going on. he sat ringside to cover ali/frazier 1, madison square garden, march 3rd, 1971. it's kind of you to join us. what are your thoughts at this hour? >> thank you very much, brian. well, as my wife put it, we learned about this while we were out having dinner. and she said even though we knew it was coming, it was a punch in the gut. ali was a genius, a great athlete, and a man of his times who became an international symbol of those times.

and i doubt that there's been somebody in pop culture anywhere near -- near his -- near him who had that kind of worldwide impact. >> as you've been talking, larry, we're watching this endless parade and we could watch them all night and actually we may end up watching them all night, of still photos, mostly, of muhammad ali, one of them we just went by is ali meeting jimmy carter at the white house. jimmy carter famously had him over for dinner at the white house. in the background is the painting of abraham lincoln. it's all just some killer imagery and as i said earlier, he's kind of a figure former presidents have in common. everyone watched him. no one had ever heard or seen

anyone like him before. >> and i once interviewed nelson mandela, who himself had been an amateur boxer, and we talked about ali. and mandela was in prison during most of ali's career. and yet he told me how he had been known by every human being in africa, and how what an inspiration he was. and it's hard to measure the impact he had on the world. i mean, this is at a time when colonization was ending in africa. and along came this brilliant, handsome athlete from america,

speaking up during that whirlwind time of social change, when the establishments of governments all over the world were being challenged. he had changed his religion. he had been this controversial lightning rod socially. and this extraordinary showman at the same time. so i think it's fair to say there's never been anyone like him before or since. >> about the man who's been kind enough to join us by telephone to our viewers who may not know him, larry merchant covered boxing close enough to be covered in his lifetime with the perspiration of muhammad ali in the ring. because larry was ringside, and by extension, he brought us all

there too. larry, a real pleasure. sorry this brings us together, at least in a broadcasting sense. thank you very much and we're sorry about your friend. >> thank you, brian. >> let's go now to phoenix, arizona. muhammad ali had many homes in his lifetime. for a while, he was in the philadelphia suburb of cherry hill, new jersey. for a while, he was in suburban michigan. and for a long time late in life, he called the state of arizona home, specifically in and around the suburbs of phoenix, arizona. correspondent ron mott is there, where there will no doubt be a lot of remembrances there. he was a favored citizen of that place, ron. >> reporter: a fixture in this community, in the valley of the sun, brian. you know, everyone wants to take some ownership of muhammad ali. he was such that kind of an attractive character. he has raised a lot of money here for parkinson's with his

foundation that he started with some friends here in the phoenix area. they hold this celebrity fight night every spring here that has become quite the event in phoenix, bringing a-list celebrities, athletes, actors, you name it, from around the country and around the world to come here really to pay their respects to him. he was always the honored guest. and this is started back in 1994. they have raised, according to the charity, more than $118 million. t just for parkinson's, but for other charities as well over the years. so folks who have gone to bed tonight here in the valley are going to wake up with some pain in their heart as well, as are people all around the world. and if i could just take a moment for personal reflection and you've been talking about it on the air here. as a young black kid growing in the midwest in the '70s and '80s, what struck me about muhammad ali, i always felt like he was not only in the ring to

fight for himself, getting rich and famous for himself, but fighting for me and other people who looked like me growing up. that's why i was crushed when he stepped into the ring against leon spinks and actually lost in 1978, because i didn't think such a thing was even possible. i was 10 years old. i was too young to understand that he was at the end of his boxing career and it was very possible for him to lose a fight to a guy who was younger and had very little boxing experience. i remember crying that night and telling my mom how crushed i was, and i felt like the world had gone off the trarks, because that icon, this man i so looked up to, had lost in the ring and he went on to many, many more things since that fight. he actually won that title back a few months after 1978, as you were talking about. the end of his boxing career was not nearly as glorious as the prime, and that's the case obviously with way lot of athletes, but what he did after he left the ring and you guys have talked about the atlanta

olympics, it still brings a tear to my eye watching that moment with him at the top of that, lighting that cauldron, brian. >> i'm glad you said what you did. on april 12, 1945, children of age 12 in this country would have every reason to believe we'd had a permanent president, just one guy who is going to have the job, that was fdr and the world changed on that day, just as a child of 10 on the day of that loss, the night of that loss and subsequent nights would be so sad to see this man, really carved out of stone, who meant that to all of our childhoods and all of our lives in obviously different ways. this man actually lost. ron mott in phoenix, arizona. now to correspondent morgan radford who is in louisville, which is, of course, the real hometown of a young man who left there as cassius clay, is remembered as a legend.

and louisville, morgan, is where the funeral will be held, correct? >> reporter: that's right, brian. in fact, before he was the greatest of all time, he was the louisville lip. it all started in his hometown of louisville, kentucky. you can see behind me, the muhammad ali center, it opened ten years ago, specifically dedicated to preserving his legacy. the mayor has ordered all the flags in the city to be lowered to half-staff. tonight the people in louisville are reminding the world that this is a legend born and bred of kentucky soil. it also started here with cassius clay, born in 1942. when he was just 12 years old, his bike was stolen and a police officer saw him agitated and asked him what was wrong and muhammad ali said, i'm gonna whoop him. and the officer said, then you need to learn how to box first. that's what he did. the son of a man who painted the bill boards, his mother was a

domestic. he won his first heavyweight title at the age of 22. shortly therefore he converted to the nation of islam. even when i was here tonight talking to people, one woman said, she grew up, born, bred here in beautiful, and she had never heard of such a thing. she said, honestly, i'd never heard of a black muslim. she made conscientious objection con shonable. she'd never heard of such a thing. i spoke to another man from the region and he said, what's interesting, i've noticed, my opinion of him changed as america's opinion of the war changed. he said, i'll be honest, he came on the scene, he was young, he was tall, he was handsome, he was black, but he was arrogant and he was brash. but as the war changed and as american sentiment toward the vietnam war changed, it shifted, he became confident and colorful and all these things he was criticized for, me became lauded for. so tonight the people in

louisville are saying even though they share this legend with the world, he was their hometown hero first. brian? >> morgan, thank you very much for that. morgan just mentioned this life of muhammad ali intertwined with war time, a particularly unpopular conflict in vietnam. fast forward to another modern day war time in this country, 2005, a different president in the white house, george w. bush. presidents get to award the medal of freedom to notable americans. here now, a snippet of that day when president bush placed the medal around the neck of muhammad ali. >> only a few athletes are ever known as the greatest in their sport, or in their time. but when you say the greatest of all time is in the room, everyone knows who you mean. it's quite a claim to make.

but as muhammad ali once said, it's not bragging if you can back it up. [ laughter ] and this man backed it up. from the day he won the gold medal at the 1960 olympic games, we all knew there was something special about this young fighter from louisville, kentucky. and his record of 56-5, including 37 knockouts, and 19 successful title defenses hardly begins to tell the story. far into the future, fans and students of boxing will study the films and some will even try to copy his style. certain things defy imitation. the ali shuffle, the lightning jabs, the total command of the ring, and above all, the sheer guts and determination he brought to every fight. this is a man who once fought more than ten rounds with a fractured jaw.

and he fought to complete exhaustion, and victory, in that legendary clash of greats in manila. the real mystery, i guess, is how he stayed so pretty. [ laughter ] probably had to do with his beautiful soul. he was a fierce fighter and he's a man of peace. just like odessa and cassius clay sr believed their son could be. across the world, billions of people know muhammad ali as a brave, compassionate and charming man. and the american people are proud to call muhammad ali one of our own. [ applause ] >> there he was, 2005, sitting there alongside carol burnett, another american icon from a very different walk of life, and

a very different occupation. you heard president bush say there his record of the 56-5. the more important number, that is 61 professional bouts, in a punishing profession. that's a lot of punishing blows. even as good as momeuhammad ali was, things like the ali shuffle, this enormous man, who was at the same time, so graceful, had such fluid movement, we now know the price he paid for those crushing blows. he delivered scores more than that. it is just part of the life and legacy we're covering tonight with news of the death this evening of muhammad ali at the age of 74. back with more right after this. >> of all boxing, that's why i'm the greatest of all times, any i'm this pretty, this colorful, this intelligent, this fast, this witty, no, or this chatable. dad, you can just drop me off right here.

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the stage is set for me to just shock the whole planet and be recognized as not the greatest boxer, but the greatest athlete of all time. >> muhammad ali on the "today" program years ago, in 1980.

as we mentioned, he was the father of nine children. seven daughters, two sons. and as happen stance would have it, an nbc news crew sat down with his beautiful daughter laila just last week. we say beautiful daughter laila, also in the context of the next generation boxer in the ali family. we were interviewing her about a boxing profile for the upcoming summer olympic games in rio, but on this day, the discussion was about the legacy of her father and her family name. >> when i first told my father that i wanted to box, you know, he was going to have two different emotions. being that he's a father and i'm his youngest girl, chk he's going to be concerned about me, he didn't want me to fight. also being that he's the greatest of all time and he has his daughter coming behind him, he didn't want me to embarrass

him. we had two things to deal with in my family. i made it clear, that i was okay, i was a big girl and i was ready to face whatever i had to in the ring, as far as getting hurt or pain or things like that and i wasn't going to embarrass him. once we had that conversation and we were eye to eye, he supported me. i feel like there's always going to be people that try to hold you back. there's always going to be people to try to hold you back from your dreams. you have to do what's in your heart because you only have one life to live. if you go around listening to what everyone else is and not yourself, you're going to be a very unhappy person. so i believe you should go for it. everything needs to be thought out and you have to make smart decisions along the way, but ultimately, you have to do what's in your heart. >> what better legacy could the champ leave? laila ali talking about her dad. time to bring on a family friend. reverend al sharpton is here with us. they don't get more impressive young young athletes than that?

>> no, they really don't. and ali certainly loved all of his children and i think when she talked about his concern, when she was going into boxing, those that knew him and that heard him discuss it, can attest to that. but she, like her father, defied a lot of the skeptics, because she ended up being a tremendous athlete and maintained her beauty. and it was something that he, i believe, got to be very proud of. >> i had the good fortune of meeting her a few years back, as i had the good fortune of meeting her dad. and the family folk lore has it, he really had come around in his position. it took some convincing that his beautiful daughter, that it was a good idea to climb into the ring. >> yeah, it was a long, long process, but from all indications, he came around. and you know, i knew ali since

my teens. we got to know each other when he supported me in a lot of my youth work. and then down through the years, i text with his wife as late as yesterday we stayed in touch. and it was interesting, growing up, knowing him, and then watching him as he dealt with age, and then later parkinson's. but it was always something that you would hear from the older children that i knew, how he had to really come to terms with laila's boxing career. >> reverend, i think you'll agree with me that kind of what we've been saying here tonight, there will never be another like him, a truly singular figure in the history of the world, both in his combination of god-given gifts, physically, verbally, mentally, and the time he came up in. it's kind of like the world called for a transformative figure and there he was. >> no doubt about it.

i think that he probably personified transformative figures if we were to use the term. and the time he came, from his emerging as an unlikely champion. i remember, i used to tell ali when i got older, the only memories i had of going to the movies with my father, he took me when i was a kid, before -- obviously before my parents broke up, to see him fight closed circuit against sonny liston. and i was about 9, going on 10. and no one thought he could beat sonny liston. so he went from this unbelievable figure that one considered just full of braga doshia, to becoming a champion and then becoming this float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. and by the time you adjusted to that, he became a black muslim, and then he became the controversial figure. then the army, where he stood up

and gave it all up and became a man of unbelievable controversy, but unbelievable and unshakeable beliefs in something, and he became an anti-war hero. and then into being a second-time champion. i remember the night that frazier knocked him down at the garden here in new york and all of our dreams of the great return of ali was shattered and he fought his way back, of all places in the skies -- or under the skies of africa, with george foreman, and regained the title against a man who was just as awesome as sonny liston. and if that wasn't unbelievable enough, he began to transform into this statesman figure, lost the title again, in an unlikely defeat, and came back again. so, i mean, it was like the re-invention, re-in carnation, and each one of them, iconic in nature. and then as he fought this

parkinson's disease, i don't know if float like a butterfly, sting like a bee is more memorable than him, with shaking hands, lighting that torch, showing against all we face, and all of our flaws, that we can still light a torch. there's so many things that ali came to symbolize and mean to people. but i think the thing that i remember most is that he would always talk about how he believed in something and stood for it. i would always say to him how he could go from one of the most hated domestic figures to a globally loved figure in one lifetime, it's something that we will never see again, i think, not only in our lifetime, but i don't think we'll ever see again in history. >> reverend al sharpton, you were lucky to know him, and you make me really realize all over again, i wish my dad had been willing to spend the money for those closed circuit fights.

we always kind of sat in the dark and waited for the results and hoped to see clips the next day. thanks, reverend, very much, for coming on with us. mike, you were nodding through so much of that, as you have been all night. this is your world. >> yeah. i was thinking, there was no more important civil rights figure in the history of this country than an athlete. jackie, roosevelt, robinson. he retires in '57. as he leaves the stage -- >> like somebody ordered it. >> -- cassius clay is about to take the stage. then he's at the olympics in 1960. and i was saying something else. my friend arthur ashe and muhammad ali couldn't have been more different in demeanor. >> right. >> however, as arthur said to me one time, how could i ever let anybody tell me i couldn't do something, living in the same world with muhammad ali? >> right. ashe was this stately, almost

courtly figure, suffered terribly in the richmond, virginia of his youth, where, as i recall, wasn't allowed to use public courts. >> and we talked about john carlos and the salute in mexico city. and i was at centre court in wimbledon in 1975 when arthur upset jimmy connors. if you remember, when the match was over that day, in a complete uncharacteristic gesture for him, he put his fist up in the air. >> for especially conservative white sports fans, it was, as i was saying earlier, a long journey for them to come back around to ali. they were off-kilter and scared by the race talk. and then the not wanting to serve in vietnam sent a lot of them away for many, many years. >> my dad was a bombardier in the army air force.

my 92 years young father. and if anybody was going to take an aggressive posture against what ali stood for, it would have been my dad. but my dad always says this. he said, they call us the greatest generation. they talk about how brave we were. he said, that man was brave. and for my dad, that's all it took. >> yeah, that was an act of bravery in its time. charlie pierce is with us, former sports columnist for the boston herald. these days with escwire. i know you want in on this conversation. placing him in the history of our society in the last several decades. >> ever since the news broke, i keep having the walt whitman line ringing through my head. do i contradict myself? very well, i am large. i don't think there's ever been a better line written about america than that.

because -- and i don't think there's ever been a more american life than the one born cassius clay, later muhammad ali, lived. because he was one of the great manifestations of the most basic contradiction in american life, which is the first two paragraphs of the declaration of independence. all men are created equal, except the ones who aren't. and he was a magnificent manifestation of that most american of contradictions. >> charlie, how long do you think boxing will be around? i'm looking at these old videos, realizing what a different age it was. and now we view it through such a different filter of caution and head injuries and parenting is different. our society is different. i'm not saying that in the era of a sandy hook elementary, we can call ourselves a gentler society, necessarily. i'm just saying that everything

has an era. certainly he came along in the golden era of boxing. >> certainly one of the golden eras of boxing, sure. at the same time, we can't call ourselves a gentler society when somebody's making an awful lot of money off ultimate fighting and mixed martial arts, which are in their own way, much more savage than boxing is. >> that's right. >> when you look at the fighters around when he was in his prime, or when he came back, he missed most of his prime. you look at joe frazier and george foreman, but also the level below that, people like ron lyle, ken norton, ernie the acorn, probably hit harder than any other boxer of his time. these were all people muhammad ali had to go through. so if you're talking about a golden age at least of the heavyweight division, he was right in the middle of it. >> charlie in the following order, i'm going to bring in mike and dave, who are champing

at the bit to get in on this. >> mike? >> i was just thinking, as a fellow bostonian, ted williams, everybody always wondered how many home runs he would have hit, because of all the time he lost serving his country and think of how greater ali's legacy would be if he hadn't lost nearly four years because he elected not to serve his country. >> well, once again, one ever the great contradictions. but the difference between ted williams and muhammad ali is the difference in the wars they were confronted with. yeah, i don't know what those missing years would have been like. i do remember that right before it all hit the fan, "sports illustrated" ran this incredible series of pictures which were at that point, state of the art, using strobe lights and time-lapse photography and things, that demonstrated how fast and how athletic he really was, before he went away. >> incredibly fast. and charlie, i was just going to

add that it is his decision about vietnam, his conviction about vietnam, again especially those of us growing up in military families, that was a real tough sell. it was seen as anything but courageous at the time. it was such a polarizing conflict. it was chewing up hundreds, eventually thousands of our young men every year. a very tough time in society. dave zirin, you want in on this conversation? >> absolutely. you mentioned the war in vietnam. one of the under-sold part of ali's history is 1968, he's banned from boxing. he really has nobody in his corner. the money's running out. and he chose to go on a campus-speaking tour. he'd already been sentenced to five years in federal prison at this point. and he was out on appeal and waiting to appeal the case. and so the government took his passport away. so in one respect, he had nowhere to go, but on the other respect, he had a new generation

of people, anti-war activists, black freedom activists who wanted to hear what he has to say. so by one count that i read, he spoke on almost 200 campuses over the course of a little more than a year. so he's speaking, three, four campuses a week. there's a terrific documentary, the trials of muhammad ali, that actually charts his speaking at these campuses, and how in the beginning, he's a little bit stilted and believe it or not, feeling a little bit insecure, talking to these college kids. but by the end of the year, at the ivy, he's just knocking people down left and right with his debating skills. it's really a remarkable thing. i think part of his great story is how he redefines intelligence in our minds. the other thing i really wanted to say, the previous segment when you were showing the bush clip, this is what makes ali relevant to this day and why so many people will mourn him in different ways. that was september 2005. george bush puts a medal around

the neck of muhammad ali. contemporaneous with that moment, there was a protest in new orleans after katrina where it said, no rocky ever left me to die on a room. direct reference about no vietcong ever called me the n word. so that idea that what he said then still speaks to people today in a way that really does speak truth to power and challenge people in powerful positions is one of the reasons why his relevance, i think, will never die. >> charlie, one of the topics we handled with dave earlier in our conversation was the part of muhammad ali's life and career people don't dwell on as much. he had trouble exiting the stage cleanly, gracefully, and at the right time. >> yeah, he did hang on too long. i think it was joyce carol oats who said the worst things

about -- i think it was -- i don't know if she was referring to the first or second fight with joe frazier, but the worst thing about one of those fights was they learned he could take a punch. and i think mike pointed out earlier, before the exile, he didn't have to worry about that. because you weren't going to hit him. baugh, again, i go back to the same theme of contradictions. this is a guy who, for all his benevolence, could be enormously cruel in the ring. he was very cruel to floyd patterson, to ernie terrell. and he was in a very cruel business. and i don't think -- i don't think that part of it ever alluded him. >> we were talking about his tour of the ivy leagues, speaking in any form on any ivy league campus would quake most of us to our boots. it is something he later found a comfort level in, a part of his

appearance at harvard now. >> love can be seen in all aspects of life, once we understand it. love for those whom depend upon one, love for those whom one comes in contact with in everyday life, love for one's country, love for one's race, love for humanity. it can even extend to love for the smallest creature, an insect that lives. if we study the qualities of the heart, we will find that the heart quality is a loving quality. it becomes the loving manner, the manner of god himself. and all such attributes as greatness, tolerance, gentleness, mercy, compassion, spring from the heart. the greatest teachers and the greatest prophets of god, they did not become what they were by the miracles or their wonder workers. what was most apparent in them was their loving manner, read the eyes of the prophets. look at the way jesus christ

treated all those who came to them, when they were brought to the master, he raised them up with his compassion. jesus was on the side of the guilty accused ones, the fisherman, yet the master lived with all of them and he won their hearts in the end, this was by the loving manner. so the first and most important thing that we all must try to understand is the cultivating of the heart quality and there's only one way to cultivate the heart quality, and that is to become more and more selfless, not selfish, but selfless. what prevents man from the loving manner is the thought of himself. and the more we think of self, the less we think of others until at the end of the journey in life, self meets us like a giant. but if the first step we take, if we take it on the spiritual path, we struggle with this

giant. >> wow. 1975 on the campus of harvard. i'm told that reverend al sharpton is still able to see and hear us. that was preaching by any other title, something you have a little bit of experience in. >> yeah, you know if you were ever around him, he would go over these quotes and he would always have these little sayings, and he was almost like always testing his material. and he was very good at it. and he was very sincere about it. but he had all of these parables, all of these quotes and all of these sayings. he also, brian, had a side of him that was fun. because he liked to do little magical tricks. and you would be in a serious moment and you would feel him doing something behind your ear and playing magical tricks. but something i never told, talking about his continued relevance. just a couple of years ago, one of my national action network board members, part of the team

representing cam newton, the quarterback, he called me and said, for cam's birthday. melvin morris, he wanted to surprise him and i could arrange to have mrs. ali talk to cam as a surprise to wish him happy birthday. i called her. i set it up. she told me what time to call the house in phoenix and i called cam, wished him happy birthday. he was surprised i called. i said hold on. i put on mrs. ali. i connect through my cell phone and mrs. ali said yeah, cam on cam? and he said yes, this is mrs. muhammed ali an he said oh my god, your husband was my idol. and she said hold on a minute. and ali, who literally had problems speaking at this time. we're only talking about a couple of years ago said man, you pretty like me. and this kid went bananas. so even then when he had those moments of breakthrough, he would use it. so here you have the guy who just became the biggest guy in

football, generations after ali's great stature, just excited, probably the biggest birthday because muhammed ali got on the phone and through his fighting this disease, wished him a happy birthday. so relevance is never going to be an issue with muhammed ali. >> i will say cam newton among the better-looking young athletes out there and reverend since you've been talking, we just saw the history of men's fashion and icons through the years. that picture look at that. alley, the godfather of soul and then on the right, maybe 200 pounds ago, is al sharpton, that's unbelievable. >> that's 1981. muhammed ali and james brown brought me on the "tom snyder show" to talk about the '80s and rag-just came -- reagan had juse in and what they thought was

going to happen in urban and black communities. and they wanted to introduce me to america and we did the "tom snyder show." probably the first network show i did. to be introduced to the nation by the two biggest legends of that time, ali, arguably the most famous man in the world at that time, is something that i'll never forget. notwithstanding the wardrobe that you mentioned. >> you're fine. james brown, may he rest in peace, is proof that if you're going to wear the v-neck and the vest and the cowboy hat, just be sure to own it. he owned it because he was james brown. reverend thank you very much. mike lupica is looking at all of this as great comic relief. i was a young kid, high school, recovering from knee surgery after a tragic high school football career, visiting a hotel in new york with my family, elevator door opens, there's the greatest. july 4th, 1976.

it was like being in the presence of a deity, i didn't know what to do. just an unbelievable feeling. >> i'm watching the speech at harvard, i'm thinking okay, this is harvard. this is a convert to islam. but the more he got revved up, i'm thinking, that would play great on sunday, at the abysinnian in new york city. >> no teleprompter. by that time in his life, 1975, that's extemporaneous, a beautiful speech and pace to it. >> that's a star. there's qualities to stardom thaw can't define. there's a magic to this man. and we spent a lot of time tonight talking about the force of his talent. but the force of his talent wouldn't have been the same

without the force of his personality. when he got going, you got an insight into this man's heart and soul. it sounds corny, but it's not. anybody who was ever in his presence, especially in the small rooms before a fight, it was, it could be overwhelming. >> and the point you made earlier tonight, we have the great good fortune in our line of work, especially in this city, of going to a lot of star-studded charity functions. i think i was at one of the bonakante family dinners, muhammed ali in his final years, after he was robbed of his ability to speak, you go up to him to greet him and he would do that great thing like he was going to haul off and smack you and then he would break into a wide smile. it was his way of communicating, it was magical, you felt ten feet tall. >> when you look, you look at the sweep of this man's life. this american life. and this extraordinary sports career, and you know, we were talking before we came on the

air. we've had a lot of boxers in this country, okay? back to jack johnson and tuny versus dempsey and grats yziano versus zale. and can you make a case that the man we're talking about that passed away tonight fought the three most famous fights in history. ali -- frazier one. >> dave time for you to be profound as we're nearing the end of the hour, pick up right where mr. lupica left off. >> i spoke at the muhammed ali center about ten years ago, got out of the airport in louisville. got in the cab, my cab driver was a vietnam vet sniper, he was listening to rush limbaugh loud in the car. he was talking to me about how angry he was about the anti-protesters, i guess he thought i would be a sympathetic ear on that. and then he, i couldn't help it, i said to him, you know i am going to the muhammed ali

center, the most famous draft resistor in the history of war. i got to ask you as a proud member of rush limbaugh's army. what do you think about alley? he said, you got to love ali? i said what do you mean you got to love ali. he said ali was brave and he risked it all. you got to respect that. >> i keep coming back to his title. the greatest. and how many people, how many millions of people are really going to learn what they know about muhammed ali over these next few days. those of us lucky enough to share a planet and a timeframe and part of a lifetime with him, i'm not talking about those of us who were lucky enough to know him. i did not. those of us who were lucky enough to watch him, to see him, to exist alongside of him. he was the only one who proclaimed himself the greatest. and then backed it up. and it's through tracing his

life and times, that you trace american life over the past few decades. mike, we've been saying warfare, race relations, the struggle. >> athletics, marketing. branding, to be gross about it. communications, and just being a charismatic icon. >> and brian, think about it, the most we've all continued to circle back to tonight is the olympics in atlanta in 1996. and even in that impaired state, his voice stolen, his grace stolen, where you really wondered if he could actually get the torch lit, one more time, this man made the world stop and watch and hold its breath and pay attention. not bad. >> we wanted to let everyone know coming up in the next hour is a special look at the life and times of muhammed ali, there will be many hours of commemoration in the days to

come on up to and including the final service for muhammed ali. in his hometown of louisville. to put a finer point on it, a point we made earlier this evening, he became famous in the era before social media. when either through your words or deed, you had to back it up. and you became famous the hard way. these days on social media, it takes you a few minutes, you can find a few thousand people no doubt proclaiming themselves to be the greatest. but for this man in our times and in what will now become the time of muhammed ali, trust us, as you'll see over these next few days, he really was again, we will continue remembering the life and times, the career, the magic, the brilliance, the charisma of this man born cassius clay, became muhammed

ali, became a living legend. our thanks to all our guests who have helped us through our coverage. and that will do it for this hour of our coverage, muhammed ali, gone at the age of 74. yeah, i'm in africa, yeah, africa's my home. damn america and what america thinks. africa is the home of a black man and i was a slave 400 years ago and i'm going back home to fight among my brothers. yeah. >> for these two african-americans to come home it was a great, great significance. because of hollywood and tv, a lot of us had been taught to tate africa. there was a time when you