Muhammad Ali on How to Be "The Greatest" Poker Player

When Muhammad Ali died a couple of weeks ago, there was, inevitably, a profusion of media stories compiling some of his most memorable quotations. The one that was new to me and caught my attention was about how a fight is won or lost not in the ring, but in the preparation.

I tracked down the original, and I think it's worth quoting in its full context, rather than the shortened form in which it's widely circulated. It comes from his 1975 autobiography, The Greatest: My Own Story:

Only four months ago, in Madison Square Garden, I fought [Joe] Frazier for the second time. I won it and evened up my score with him. But before I got in the ring, I'd won it out here on the road. Some people think…