Facing Ali: 15 Fighters / 15 Stories [Hardcover]

Stephen Brunt (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2003

Muhammad Ali cast a blinding light on his sport, on the tumultuous times in which he reigned as champion, and on all the people who surrounded him. That included the fighters brave enough to stand alone, in the ring with the greatest heavyweight champion of all time.
Ali's own story has been told often, but the tales of those who faced him have been mostly overlooked. For each, the moments alone in the ring with Ali changed their lives. FACING ALI tells the stories, in the fighters' own words, of fifteen men from around the world--from famous names like Joe Frazier, George Foreman, and Henry Cooper, to lesser lights like Tunney Hunsaker, Jergen Blin, and George Chuvalo. FACING ALI offers a unique perspective on what it was like to fight Ali, and gives new insights into the character of a boxer who is arguably the most recognized man on the planet.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Brunt provides penetrating and honest profiles of 15 fighters from around the world who faced Muhammad Ali, and he produces a book that should become one of the essential works for understanding the legendary fighter. Brunt's subjects range in chronological order from Tunney Hunsaker, the first man to fight Ali (then known as Cassius Clay) as a professional, to Larry Holmes, whose crushing victory in Ali's fourth comeback showed that the champion's career was truly finished. In between, Brunt (columnist for Toronto's Globe and Mail) offers bracing new looks at Ali's well-known opponents, including Joe Frazier, Ken Norton and George Foreman. Some of Brunt's best portraits, however, bring to life those "extremely unlikely tales, longshots, no-hopers, fighters lifted out of obscurity for their date with the most famous man on earth," such as Germany's Jurgen Blin, who fought Ali and the next day "was back at work at the sausage factory." Although each story varies, Brunt is amazingly sensitive to and respectful of each fighter's own words, no matter how factually wrong or self-serving they might be. He deftly illustrates how all the fighters to some degree believe that, as Jean Pierre Coopman says, "The Ali fight was the defining moment of my career," although this feeling is ironic for some, such as George Chuvalo, who despite his winning record became better known in his native Canada for going the distance with Ali and losing. Others are bitter, such as Joe Frazier, who views Ali's current Parkinson's disease unsympathetically; as Brunt cannily observes, "on the cosmic scale, [Frazier's] getting even..
- getting even."
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Muhammad Ali has been written about ad nauseum, but here we have a fresh approach: examine Ali the boxer through the eyes of his opponents. From the champs (Foreman), to the contenders (George Chuvalo), to the hopelessly overmatched (Jean-Pierre Coopman), the lives of Ali's opponents were profoundly shaped by facing (and, usually, getting pummeled by) an international icon. While Ali transcended boxing, his opponents didn't, and most of these fighters spent their lives getting beat up in the ring and out of it. That makes for fascinating reading, but for those who care more about Ali than, say, Earnie Shavers, the book is also chock-full of anecdotes and opinions about Ali as seen by his opponents. From each fighter's story, a different Ali emerges. To Frazier, Ali is a cruel bully. To Chuck Wepner, Ali is Apollo Creed to Wepner's Rocky Balboa. To Joe Bugner, Ali is just a brilliant businessman who knew how to put butts in seats. Between the perspectives on Ali and the witty, elegant retelling of 15 fighters' lives, this is a must for boxing fans. John Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: The Lyons Press; 1st edition (March 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585748293
• ISBN-13: 978-1585748297
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.8 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,625,343 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #90 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( A ) > Ali, Muhammad

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A must-read for any Ali fan., April 23, 2003

By 

Casper Melick (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Facing Ali: 15 Fighters / 15 Stories (Hardcover)

For a casual boxing fan who's too young to remember Ali, this book might be a little obscure. But for boxing fans of my generation, who grew up on Ali, your boxing library won't be complete without it. Each of the 15 opponents featured here has an interesting story to tell, and the book provides a ton of material for serious boxing historians.

What is particularly interesting is how most of these men's lives were profoundly affected by their encounter(s) with Ali. Henry Cooper, for instance, a national hero in the U.K., will still always be best known for a single punch he threw in a fight he lost: the left hook that knocked Cassius Clay (as he then was) on his butt. A few of them regard Ali with love or reverence, a few with indifference, and one, in particular, with undying resentment. Overall, one gets a remarkable education on the human condition by comparing the stories of these 15 very different men. Highly recommended.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars untold stories of those who fought "the greatest", June 24, 2004

By 

Robert Wormley (lakebay, wa United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Facing Ali: 15 Fighters / 15 Stories (Hardcover)

A great book, adding a perspective on Ali from the least reported angle - namely 15 of his opponents. Most lost, a few knocked Ali down, a few defeated him. All have won or lost the corresponding internal battle they had to fight.

the fighters range from well-known and immensely talented boxers (foreman, frazier) to some of the least capable and likely contenders for the title in the history of the sport. All are fascinating, not merely for their perspecitves on Ali, but also for the value of their own stories as minor players in the most turbulent and glorious period in boxing history.

Now if these 15 fights were only available on a dvd.....

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Another Book on the Greatest Fighter of All-Time, January 30, 2007

By 

kone "kone" (USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Facing Ali: 15 Fighters / 15 Stories (Paperback)

Muhummad Ali is the most-photographed, most-written about, most-quoted, and most-popular athlete of all-time. So how does an author come up with a "new" angle on the Ali story that has not already been covered? Well, Author Stephan Brunt comes up with a new tact - 15 fighters who faced Ali in the squared circle tell about their experieces in their own words. This is a unique concept that has not been attempted before in the annals of boxing literature. My hat is tipped to Mr. Brunt for coming up with such a unique angle. I also applaud him for not severely editing the commentary of the opponents stories. The words are there warts and all, especially in the bitterness expressed by Joe Frazier.

The book presents 15 fights, and the individual stories of the opponents are written in vivid detail. Brunt gives a brief history of the opponent, how he became a fighter, how he came to fight Ali, and what happened to him afterwards. The 15 fighters represent several of Ali's best fights, including Joe Frazier, George Foreman, Larry Holmes, and Ernie Shavers. Too bad we could not have read about Ali's greatest upset fight, i.e. Sony Liston's experience in words - now that would heve been eye-popping! (Liston died of an apparent drug overdose in late 1970.)

Brunt does a thorough job with each fighter. He does not so much concentrate on the blow to blow action in the fight, but rather, what the opponent was thinking and feeling before, during, and after the fight. It makes for very interesting reading for boxing fans in general, and of course Ali fans.

I could not give it a 5-star ranking as it was not spell-binding, but for being unique and holding my interest throughout, it deserves a solid 4-stars.

Jim "Konedog" Koenig