ALAMEDA, Calif. — When Muhammad Ali passed away last Friday, the memories came to Ken Norton Jr. in a rush.
The Oakland Raiders defensive coordinator flashed back to being a 6-year-old kid, sitting in a room at the La Jolla Village Inn with his grandmother. His father, Ken Norton Sr., was fighting Ali at the nearby San Diego Sports Arena on March 31, 1973.
“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Norton, a former Seahawks linebackers coach, said Tuesday in an interview with the Bay Area News Group. “My father didn’t allow me to go to the fights, so we had to sit around and wait for the news to get back to the hotel. We finally got the news that he had won, that he had broken (Ali’s) jaw . it was one of the most exciting times of my life.
Norton fought Ali three times, each fight as close as the next. Norton won the first one. Some observers believe he won all three.
“He and my father became real good friends, competitors that came to respect one another,” Norton said. “We were very thankful for the start that he gave us.”
Ken Jr. met Ali on a handful of occasions, finding him to be “very kind, very approachable and playful. He used to do magic tricks, showing us how he could levitate off the ground. Always smiling, asking how we were doing. Even now my sister is best friends with one of his daughters. Our families were intertwined like that.”
When Ken Sr. was in a serious auto accident in 1986 and wasn’t expected to survive, Ali spent two days visiting with him at the hospital. By the time Ken Sr. died after a series of strokes in 2013, Ali, stricken with Parkinson’s Syndrome, couldn’t speak but reached out to Ken Jr. and family through his wife, Lonnie.
Ali, a 5-to-1 favorite in the first bout, entered the ring wearing a robe furnished by Elvis Presley, angling for a rematch with Joe Frazier for the heavyweight belt.
Ken Norton Sr. was 29-1, but had fought nobody of note and had suffered an eighth-round knockout loss to Jose Luis Garcia.
“He was kind of a tuneup for Ali in between fights, and it was considered one of the biggest mismatches,” Norton Jr. said. “It was early in his career, and he was really fortunate Ali agreed to fight him. And at that point, my father was in the best shape of his life.”
Ken Sr. was a single father at the time, working at a Ford plant during the day, training at night. He would occasionally leave Ken Jr. with neighbors to make sure his son would get a good meal.
“There were so many things we didn’t have,” Ken Jr. said. “We were in a one-bedroom apartment. I was always begging him for a bike. We were never able to get one. I was begging him, ‘Dad, can we have a home?’”
After the fight, Ken Jr. got his bike, Ken Sr. bought a home in Carson, and the nobody became a contender. Norton, who briefly held the WBC heavyweight belt in 1978, retired in 1981 with a record of 42-7-1.
Ken Jr. understands his father not wanting to see him fight, but as he became older and an athlete, they watched tapes of the Ali bouts together.
“I kind of talked them through with him. I just wanted to see what my father had,” Norton said. “He was athletic, he was long, he was quick, he had intensity, he was smart. I see a lot of carry-over between boxing and football, so I understand what he went through.”
Norton takes pride in the fact that his father fought 39 rounds with Ali that were nearly dead even. Ali won the second fight by split-decision and the third by an extremely close and controversial unanimous decision.
“(My father) arguably won all three of them,” Norton said. “As great as Ali was, my father was the one guy who was able to stand toe to toe with him. It’s something I’m very proud of.”
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