Joe Frazier Dies: Boxing Great 'Smokin' Joe Loses Final Fight to Cancer
Former heavyweight boxing champion Joe Frazier lost his battle with liver cancer at the age of 67, Monday evening.
The boxing great was diagnosed with the disease back in late September and has been in hospice care battling the disease ever since.
His family released a statement saying, “We The Family of the 1964 Olympic Boxing Heavyweight Gold Medalist, Former Heavyweight Boxing Champion and International Boxing Hall of Fame Member Smokin’ Joe Frazier, regrets to inform you of his passing.”
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Frazier’s family has asked for privacy in the days following his death.
In the weeks leading up to Frazier's untimely death the former champion denied requests by other boxing greats such as Larry Holmes to visit him at his bedside.
Frazier’s manager Les Wolff explained that the former Olympian “doesn’t want to see anybody, the way he is now. I think you can understand why. He’s a proud man.”
One of Frazier’s defining moments as a boxer occurred in 1971 when he was the first fighter to knock down “The Greatest” Muhammad Ali. Frazier won the heavyweight title vs. Ali, in one of the biggest fights in boxing history at New York City’s Madison Square Garden.
The fight was known as “The Fight of the Century” and Frazier had said of that historic night at Madison Square Garden, “That was the greatest thing that ever happened in my life.”
Throughout the duration of Frazier's career the two boxers would be constantly compared and would meet in the ring two more times before Frazier's retirement.
In a statement regarding Frazier’s passing Ali said, “I will always remember Joe with respect and admiration. My sympathy goes out to his family and loved ones.”
He also said, “The world has lost a great champion.”
Frazier was born in South Carolina in 1944 and grew up on a farm. Both his son and daughter went on to become boxers as well. Frazier’s daughter, Jacqui, ironically went on the battle Ali’s daughter, Laila, in the boxing ring a decade ago.
Frazier retired in 1976. He came out of retirement once in 1981, but ultimately gave up his boxing career and established a boxing program for inner city youth in Philadelphia, where he resided with his family until his untimely death on Monday.
