Twice Blessed

Omaha is an unusual cite for a world heavyweight championship fight. Nonetheless, then-champion Joe Frazier agreed to it because his challenger, Ron Stander, was from across the river in Iowa. I was in the city visiting my brother, so we took my young son to the place where Stander was training a couple of days before the fight. To our surprise, his training site was the grimey basement of a small bar in the rough part of town, and only a dozen observers were on hand. Then we heard that Frazier was holding court and signing autographs at the main mall, so off we went. We entered the mall lobby to find Frazier seated at a table but with a crowd of a few hundred and some thirty persons deep surrounding him. Luckily my son was seated atop my shoulders, because the champion was able easily to spot him. "Let that kid through," Joe told his bodyguards, and they began pushing the fans aside to allow me, son, and brother to approach Joe's table where he promptly signed his autograph, then patted son on his head. "Wish me luck, kid," Frazier said. "Good luck, I replied." "Not YOU, you idiot," a bodyguard whispered to me.

It was Cleveland a time later. Then-champion Mohammed Ali was in town to defend his world title against Chuck Wepner of Newark. I took my same son to the arena, where the local pro-basketball team plays, to watch Ali work out. When he finished sparring, the bystanders gathered near the ring steps to watch the champ descend. Ali's trainer-counselor, Bounini (the creator of Mohammed's famous "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee!"), began pushing the fans aside. But when he saw my son, he had Ali stop beside him so that the champ could pat son on his head.

So does my son today like boxing? No. And he disdains the new middle name which I legally added to his birth certificate: Mohammed-Joe.

-Old Doc