I still can’t believe [ Muhammad Ali ] knows my name. It astounds me he knows who I am. I first met Ali in 1976. I was locked up in a juvenile home and he came to visit. I’ve never forgotten it.

Fear is the greatest obstacle to learning. But fear is your best friend. Fear is like fire. If you learn to control it, you let it work for you. If you don’t learn to control it, it’ll destroy you and everything around you. Like a snowball on a hill, you can pick it up and throw it or do anything you want with it before it starts rolling down, but once it rolls down and gets so big, it’ll crush you to death. So one must never allow fear to develop and build up without having control over it, because if you don’t you won’t be able to achieve your objective or save your life.

Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth. Then, like a rat, they stop in fear and freeze.

I'am not predictor of fights, but I know when I hit 'em good, the fight is close to an end

It's the emotional punches that you can't see that are just overwhelmingly devastating to your heart - your moral fiber.

I just want them to keep bringing guys on and I'am going to strip them of their health. I bring pain a lot of pain.

I always had a lot of responsibilities. I just didn't take them. I just decided to take care of my responsibilities, live up to them. That's a pretty interesting job. It's harder than being heavyweight champion of the world.