In boxing’s long history of fights nobody wanted, the February 1976 contest between heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali and Belgium’s Jean-Pierre Coopman would rank near the top. Of course, mismatches were nothing new in boxing. They weren’t even new to Ali. But something about this one, perhaps because Ali’s stature was at its highest, left people perplexed. Even Ali admitted the event was nothing more than an easy moneymaker. When critics addressed the great gap in talent between the champion and challenger, a gap Evel Knievel couldn’t have jumped with a rocket, Ali shut them down. “They want me to fight all my fights like I’m fighting for my life,” Ali said. “I have a right to take a few easy ones.” Ali had a point. Though his fame was at its zenith, with his name and face known around the world in a way unthinkable for any previous athlete, Ali was less than five months removed from the grueling “Thrilla in Manila.” At the end of that historic bout, where he’d scored a 15th-round TKO of his archrival, Joe Frazier, Ali was exhausted to his bones. The Manila bout was so physically taxing that Ali might’ve
FIFTY YEARS AGO, AT THE HEIGHT OF HIS POPULARITY BUT IN THE TWILIGHT OF HIS CAREER, MUHAMMAD ALI DEFENDED THE HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE AGAINST AN OBSCURE NO-HOPER NAMED JEAN-PIERRE COOPMAN THE YAWN FROM SAN JUAN
IN PUERTO RICO By Don Stradley
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