Mayweather's reaction was priceless. He comically started staring at the rope to see if it had been 'injured'!

Ali was a great boxer. But Ali the human being was greater than Ali the boxer. His wit, his philosophy, his eloquence, his trash-talking, his confidence - bravado, really. There is hardly ever going to be any boxer who will measure up to that. Here's what George Foreman had to say about the man:

"If you put Ali in boxing, you won’t get what he really was. The life he lived outside of the ring, what he had to say, the bravery he had, made him what he was: a prophet, a hero, a revolutionary — much more than a boxer. It really brings him down to rate him as a boxer. He only did boxing to run his mouth. Whatever message he was destined to get across, he used boxing to do it. I mean, he could do the shuffle and occasionally throw a good jab, even get a few knockouts, but that doesn't put him in boxing. Forget about boxing, he’s been a gift to the world."

This Mayweather fellow does rank high up there with the best of them. But I prefer to leave the GOAT title to that one man, Muhammad Ali.

Archives on google show there were better boxers....before my time!!!!!

I agree Seppuku the Greatest of All Time is still the one and only Mohammed Ali.

He was not only a tactical genius but a master of psychology in the ring. Here is an excerpt from the writing about his fight with George Foreman in Zaire:

"After several rounds of this, Foreman began to tire. His face became increasingly damaged by hard, fast jabs and crosses by Ali. The effects were visible as Foreman was staggered by an Ali combination at the start of the fourth round, and again several times near the end of the fifth, after Foreman had seemed to dominate that round. Although Foreman kept throwing punches and coming forward, after the fifth round he looked increasingly worn out. Ali continued to taunt him by saying, "They told me you could punch, George!" and "They told me you could punch as hard as Joe Louis." According to Foreman, near the end of the fight, Foreman slammed Ali with a thundering body blow, and Ali whispered to him "Is that all you got, George?" to which Foreman thought "Yep...that's about it." After that, Ali began to dominate Foreman."

Mayweather will need a few lifetimes before he can be half of what Ali was.

It's also interesting that welter-weights like Floyd would seem to steal the thunder from the heavyweights. It seems to me that in the 70's, 80's and 90's, few people even knew there were other divisions besides the heavyweight.

I agree. Just noting the contrast that heavyweight boxing isn't as much of a big deal now as it was then. Nothing to underrate boxers in other divisions.

True that. hes always running( literally) away. Against guerrero earlier this year and then yesterday, just running away. true hes intelligent, but not entertaining. I'd rather Holyfield, Riddick Bowe, Lennox lewis...generation

reminds me of the Ricky Hatton fight. Hope one day will see mayweather vs pacquao fight

Watched Knockout sports on Sony Max - Saturday or Sunday [Can't remember which]. They had a special on Tyson - two or three episodes back to back. It was just a joy to watch and go back down memory lane. A couple of greats retired after being knocked out by tyson! One fellow - I forget his name, had never been knocked down let alone knocked out and everyone thought he's the one who would tame tyson. And the dude was huge! What tyson did to him... I believe he never fought again. A combination of blows and the dude fell on the canvas like he had been hit with a sledge hammer! The minute he hit the canvas you could tell there is no way in hell he's going to stand up.

Its a shame ESPN Classic is not aired anymore on DSTV. Boxing greats like R Marciano,J Dempsey, J Louis ans S Liston will be missed by sports fans greatly.