Talk:The Rumble in the Jungle

Ali changed to Hardiman?
I noticed that suddenly every reference to Ali in the Rumble part is now Hardiman. It seems pretty consistent so is there a reasoning for this or is this some sort of vandalism?

- Wackjum 03:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

The legitimacy of the fight
I don't know too much about this, but isn't there some controversy over whether Ali won legitimately? If you've explored the subject you are aware that there was overwhelming support for Ali, and little for Foreman in that particular region. "Ali, kill him" became a common chant in the days before the fight. Also, if you watch the original footage, you'll see that foreman gets up immediately after having been punched. Perhaps they had different rules over there, but isn't there supposed to be a count? I would like to see an analysis over whether the support for Ali resulted in an over enthusiastic audience, which may have altered the reaction of those responsible for deciding the match. - Seg 22:36, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

I've timed the knockdown several times. Referee Zack Clayton obviously did do the count. By my own timing with a stopwatch, over and over again, Foreman was down on the floor for approximately 11.1 to 11.3 seconds. I'm not aware of any controversy about who won. Famspear (talk) 03:08, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Exactly, if you count the seconds when Foreman was knocked out on the floor, Ali won legitimately. People think that Foreman get up before the 10 seconds because the noise and acclaim of the crowd don't allow to count the seconds well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.16.1.242 (talk) 15:28, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Explain npov claim
Anyone can slap a npov tag on anything, but it is really not useful if the npov claim is not explained. --Ezeu 23:37, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

In any event, the tendency towards hyperbole ("microsecond") is undesirable if the purpose of an encyclopedia is accurate. -- I feel embarassed having to explain this (but I didn't slap on the NPOV), but the the language praising Ali is subjective, and the text read like a story with the purpose of creating exhilaration in anticipation of Ali's victory. I love Ali too. But I can describe his victories without sounding like a used-car salesman.

How?
It was to Ali's advantage that the people supported him. And also, Foreman did not get up immediatly. He may have got up right before 10, but it was too close. He would of been knocked out later anyways.


 * --Nugneant 06:59, 9 May 2006 (UTC)


 * As noted elsewhere in this thread, I've run a stopwatch many times on the film of the fight, and the best I can come up with is that Foreman was down for at least 11.1 seconds. Most readings, I get 11.2 or 11.3 seconds. Famspear (talk) 03:10, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

ALI WON
theres no doubt he deseved to win and it would of happened anyways

This is an illegitimate comment. May the wikipedia community ignore it. --Zpobric 07:00, 5 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Are you a Royal Prince? --Nugneant 07:01, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

May 9th Minor Cleanup
I'm not a boxing fan, just someone who likes sports trivia. It's my objective opinion that this article was an abominably written trainwreck. One uses the past tense when covering sporting events (unless one is captioning or annotating a photo-stream). It read sort of like one of those "Greatest Sports Heroes" books one would buy for $1.00 - the ones that are about the size of a baseball card and written for 3rd graders. And beyond all this, it's definitely biased towards Ali.

Anyway. I went in and did my best to change it to past tense, as the present tense was majorly annoying - but let prosterity show that yes, this article needs clean-up. --Nugneant 07:06, 9 May 2006 (UTC)


 * And you've done a nice job! I believe that some judicious snipping here and there of over-the-top comments about Ali are in order.  The article is entirely too long on breathless description and short on historical data.  I'll come back to this later this week and trim it a bit.  I am looking to add some internal links as well to try and tie the Fight in with important world events and culture.  Nugneant deserves out thanks. Lisapollison 21:59, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Article Quality
Seems to be biased and I agree with Lisapollison.

A terrible/great (however you want to say it) example is under Reactions: "Also, when Ali walking to the stage at the Oscars to be part of the group receiving the Oscar for When We Were Kings, a documentary of the fight in Zaire, he has trouble doing so because of the effects of Parkinson's disease and Foreman helps him up the steps."

It is horribly simple and grammatically mutated.

I agree, this article needs cleaning, and less opinion is required.

Overall it is very superficial.

Rambling in the Jungle
This article really has very little to do with an encyclopedia entry. I'm tempted to throw 75% of the text out and leave just the basic facts on the fight and make some more connections like those now under Reactions and Cultural influence. But then again, maybe I'd better leave this to a real boxing fan. --Stefan29 19:58, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

I've done quite a bit of editing, but I need a boxing expert to help me. My knowledge only does so far.--FrasierC 23:05, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

If somebody can get a boxing expert on here, ask them to add the reason there was no rematch to the article.


 * I'm not sure if I count as an expert, (although I probably know more than most, being a fan of boxing and fairly knowledgeable about its history), but from what I know it ultimately comes down to two things. On Foreman's side, his confidence, mentality and desire to fight were all shattered by the loss. With Foreman no longer the invincible monster and looking very sloppy and lackluster in what should have been easy fights after the fight in Zaire, the public lost interest in him. His people tried a bunch of things to get Foreman's confidence back, including an exhibition where Foreman fought and KOd 5 different boxers back to back, but it just didn't work. In 77 Foreman was beat by the light hitting boxer Jimmy Young and retired.


 * On Ali's side, just a year after the fight with Foreman Ali went into the ring for the 3rd time Frazier for the Thriller in Manila, a brutal bout that took a lot of what Ali had left as a fighter. (Ali always said the Thriller was the closest he came to dying in the ring). Afterwards Ali seemed to prefer taking on fights that were not quite so taxing or dangerous. Make no mistake, he took on a lot of good fighters, (the same Jimmy Young that ended Foreman's first career, Ron Lyle, Earnie Shavers, et al), but also a lot of bums and guys who didn't belong in the same ring with Ali. (See Jean-Pierre Coopman, generally considered to be the most undeserving and unqualified fighter to ever get a shot at a world title). So basically, Foreman was shot mentally and Ali was running out of tricks and miracles physically. Wandering Man

From a boxing fan's POV one thing that's missing from the entry is that it underestimates how often, and how hard, Ali hit Foreman. Ali caught Foreman coming in and beat him to the punch nine time out of ten. Foreman's defense was poor and he walked right into shots, increasing the damage. In retrospect, it isn't that surprising that Ali won; he was a much better boxer and threw straighter punches. The only fighters Ali ever had trouble with in his prime were hook-shot artists like Frazier, who would get inside his guard.Mumblio 21:45, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

From a boxing fan's POV another thing missing from the entry is the round-by-round scoring. This is like reading a long article about a baseball game without ever hearing who got a hit or was struck out, only color commentary followed by the final score. Round-by-round scoring would provide a neutral descriptor of how the fight progressed up to the moment of the (controversial) TKO. 149.101.1.129 17:51, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

The description of the fight is not only terrible, it's not accurate. I just watched again, Ali didn't use the ropes util halfway through the fifth. I know it's strylish to talk about rope-a-dope but in fact, it was a minor part of the strategy. Ali pretty much annihilated Foreman throughout the fight. Every round was a boxing lesson. The emotional context of the fight seems to have eclipsed the fact that Ali was a technical wizard and gave a perfect performance in this fight. Watch it on youboob, it's amazing. 172.58.43.131 (talk) 08:03, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

I am a serious student of Ali's fights; I will try to fix this article up; it's a mess from start to finish. It reads like somebody with a passing knowledge of the fight typed it up in a few minutes.RaulGroom 21:09, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm setting up a new page called Rumble in the Jungle - UPDATED. Anyone who's interested can come by and discuss it while it's under construction; it will probably take me about a week before I can replace this page with that one.RaulGroom 21:12, 23 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Copies of articles aren't allowed in article space, but you can feel free to work on a new version in your user space. Stevie is the man!  Talk • Work 03:34, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Image
The image used in this article is very strange. It seems to bear no relation to the article's contents. Clicking the image leads to an explanation that it is a video cover, but even so I don't think it illustrates the article at all well. Bobo12345 15:01, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

I think what we need is the fight poster, especially since Ali married one of the poster models, and an image from the fight. The picture we have right now really doesn't belong here, aside from the fact that it's very small and very low on the page. --ChandlerH 14:03, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Ali-Foreman.jpg
Image:Ali-Foreman.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot 04:38, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:When We Were Kings.jpg
Image:When We Were Kings.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 15:33, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Intro
10 line intro with 7 lines about the promotion for the fight? That should be further down the article in my opinion, with more on the background to the fight or how it panned out in the intro. You know, stuff about the actual sport of boxing. 72.201.194.38 (talk) 21:36, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

POV claim
It has been called "arguably the greatest sporting event of the 20th century" ..in an obscure American sports blog. Why is this there? Bataaf van Oranje (Prinsgezinde) (talk) 08:29, 10 June 2016 (UTC)


 * I have found two reliable sources for the quote, Jay Caspian Kang and Christopher McDougall. It appears Kang was already referenced in the article years ago, but was removed, so I restored the Kang reference while also adding McDougall. Maestro2016 (talk) 18:19, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

Viewership numbers
The claimed viewership of over 1 billion is both frequently found and dubious in the extreme, as the global population at the time was only 4 billion, many of whom had no access to, nor likely interest in, ways to view the fight. The sources linked to support this claim are a passing and unsupported mention in a 1995 issue of Jet magazine and a retrospective article in USA Today, neither of which offer their own sources or substantial explanations. In fact, viewership numbers for the event have never been verified, and the only primary reference to the number comes from Don King, viz: “More people will see Foreman and Ali mix styles than any previous sporting event in history. A “total audience at more than a billion people is not a gross exaggeration.” (Cited in Erenburg, L.A., "The Rumble in the Jungle," 2021). Since King, particularly at the time, could hardly be considered impartial enough to project realistic viewership figures, let alone before the fight was even held, the figure should be struck from the page unless a more reliable, independently verified source is given. WhampoaSamovar (talk) 18:42, 27 January 2022 (UTC)
 * You make some convincing arguments. Has any reliable source made these arguments? For what it's worth, Don King stated that 1 billion people watched, after the fight too.--Jahalive (talk) 22:32, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

Revisionist history
I think the idea the Ali was seen as a symbol of the people struggle needs better evidence. Foreman as destructive champ had a lot of local fans. 47.60.43.78 (talk) 22:41, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

George Foreman's Height
Foreman's height is listed as "6 ft 11 in (211 cm)" and that has to wrong. On his Wikipedia page he's listed at "6 ft 4 in (193 cm)" which is more realistic. 209.102.199.3 (talk) 14:34, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Who won?
I looked this article up to see who won, and I still don't know. 2A00:23CC:4D80:1101:90AF:4FC6:8593:90CE (talk) 21:26, 26 August 2023 (UTC)