Foreman had a such an interesting life story, with so many changes.
He had a rough childhood…a few years before I heard Big L’s ‘Lifestyles”, I heard George using that line “we weren’t poor, we were po’ because he we coudn’t afford the O-R”. He didn’t know who his real father was. He grew up thinking one guy was his father but he found out in his 20s that someone else was. I think that’s said to be the big reason he named his kids George or some variation of George, so they know whom their father is.
He got into a lot of shyt in the streets and later entered the job corps. I think he had only been boxing about 2 years when he went to the Olympics and won gold. He was an extremely fast learner.
He was a 3 to 1 underdog when he beat Frazier for the HW title. One of the most dominating title-winning performances ever and probably the biggest style mismatch ever between two ATG fighters.
He went into a heavy depression after losing to Ali, and then came back with the wild brawl against Lyle. He suffered from a heat stroke when he lost to Jimmy Young and thought he was going to die in the locker room and felt he saw God. He became a preacher because of that experience.
He was involved in a custody dispute with one of his ex-wives, who lived in St. Lucia. He went to St. Lucia to get his kids and escaped back to the US on a boat with Rastafarian drug smugglers.
Jeremy Schaap said “George Foreman is proof that F. Scott Fitzgerald was wrong when he said there are second acts in American lives”. George was brilliant at marketing himself when he came back. He sparred with Sonny Liston when he was young and emulated him, so he was known more as a surly bully. When he came back, his image was that of a lovable uncle. He was in commercials all the time and even a sitcom lol
He would make jokes about his weight, but he was in shape. I recently watched that Holyfield fight, and he took some vicious bombs and lasted the full 12.
The win over Moorer was one of boxing’s great moments. It surprised me at first because the shot didn’t look that big. But he hit Moorer with a previous 1-2, and you can see blood all on the canvas that came out of Moorer’s mouth. Foreman was behind in the fight but he actually landed heavy shots throughout. He was getting out landed a lot though, and was another example of Foreman having a terrific chin.