Sport: Violent Coronation in Kinshasa

The money alone makes it a unique event. For trading punches next week, George Foreman and Muhammad Ali each stand to collect a minimum of $5 million—the biggest payday in the history of sport. If the fight goes 15 rounds, they will have earned $110,000 per minute per man. In addition to guaranteeing their wages, the government of Zaïre has put up another $12 million for the combatants' expenses and to doll up the capital city of Kinshasa.

The big boodle is only one of the fight's unusual attributes. It is the first heavyweight championship to be held in Africa, and the first to be used as a national public relations spectacular. The promoters hope for a TV audience of hundreds of millions in more than 75 countries (closed-circuit arenas and theaters in the U.S. are charging between $12 and $30 a seat). This electronic gate will more than compensate for the fact that there is little chance of filling the Zaïre stadium with paying customers. It may be the first championship fight in modern history for which freebies are given out wholesale.

Unusual Aspect. That problem hardly worries Promoter Don King, the first black ever to arrange a heavyweight title bout. For the moment, at least, King has become the most important matchmaker in boxing—quite a distinction for a felon who ten years ago was known as the numbers baron of Cleveland and four years ago was No. 6178 at the Marion (Ohio) Correctional Institution, where he was serving time for killing one of his underlings."

According to the terms of the deal King negotiated, Champion Foreman gets the same basic purse as Challenger Ali. That quirk underscores the most unusual aspect of the bout. Though he won the title 20 months ago with a cruel battering of Joe Frazier, and though he has never been defeated, Foreman is still a relatively obscure figure. For one thing, he has never faced Ali the best heavyweight boxer and one of the most colorful athletes of his generation, a man who lost his title not in the ring but in a hassle over his refusal to be inducted for military service. Foreman has, in effect, been forced to trek to Kinshasa to try to become the true champ—the first in a decade to shed the shadow of Ali.

Feared Puncher. Even if Foreman wins convincingly, the coronation may be incomplete, and the champion knows it. "I can beat him and knock him out in the first or second round," Foreman says, "but that doesn't mean that people are going to follow me with the same enthusiasm as they did him. It's just something God gave him to have."

Foreman also has a present from his Maker—sheer strength—and it would seem to give him an overwhelming advantage next week. At 25, Foreman is at his powerful peak. With legs as thick as railroad ties and arms that resemble oak limbs, the 6-ft. 3-in., 225-lb. (fighting weight) Foreman is the most feared puncher since Sonny Listen. After a few blows from Foreman, the average heavy punching bag begins to look like a pancake. So do most of his opponents; none of his last eight fights have gone beyond the second round. Says his trainer, Dick Sadler, a shrewd old boxing hand who once managed Listen: "Anything George hits, he's gonna hurt."