Anytime he spoke, he dropped a lot of punchlines and inspiring quotes and showed himself as someone who uses the power of words to unsettle his rivals.
His most famous quote till date was made when he was 22 years old and was about to take on world heavyweight champion Sonny Liston.
‘Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. The hands can’t hit what the eyes can’t see’ he said.
Some of his other remarkable quotes include;
‘I wrestled with an alligator, I tussled with a whale, I handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail, I’m bad man….Last week I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalized a brick. I’m so mean I make medicine sick’, he said ahead of his famous ‘Rumble in the Jungle‘ bout with George Foreman in 1974.
In 1975 ahead of the ‘Thrilla in Manila’ bout with Joe Frazier, he said, ‘It will be a killer and a chiller and a thriller when I get the gorilla in Manila’.
‘If you even dream of beating me, you better wake up and apologize.’
‘It’s hard to be humble when you’re as great as I am’.
‘Not only do I knock’em out , I pick the round’.
‘I’m a poet, I’m a prophet, I’m the resurrector, I’m the savior of the boxing world. If it wasn’t for me, the game would be dead’.
‘It’s not bragging if you can back it up’.
‘I’m so fast that last night I turned off the light switch in my hotel room and was in bed before the room was dark’.
‘Don’t count the days, make the days count’.
‘Live every day like it’s your last because someday you’re going to be right’.
‘Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing’.
‘The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life’
Ironically, he also said, ‘I don’t like fighters who talk too much’.