After his humiliating loss to Larry Holmes on October 2, 1980, Muhammad Ali disappeared for a while. When the stories arose of his doctor misdiagnosing him with a thyroid problem and prescribing him medicine for a problem he didn’t have, Ali realized he had gone into the ring with Holmes severely handicapped. Ali already had slowed down significantly because of the already evident effects of Parkinson’s syndrome, and had been approved by the Mayo clinic when he shouldn’t have been. Ali slurred his speech, could barely punch a speed bag, skip rope, or even run in the morning. But one thing he could do is make money because of his name. That’s the reason he came back to fight Holmes, and why most fighters continue well beyond their capable years.
Determined to erase the pathetic performance against Holmes, Ali began the search to find a state that would license him for one last comeback.
After a long concerted effort, he found a place to let him fight by the fall of 1981 in Nassau, the Bahamas.
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