Muhammad Ali's daughter: Father watching Super Bowl, not near death

Muhammad Ali attends the Sports For Peace Fundraising Ball at The V&A on July 25, 2012 in London, England. / Photo by Ian Gavan/Getty Images

NEW ORLEANS Muhammad Ali's daughter knocked down rumors of her father being near death Sunday, saying he was at home watching the Super Bowl.

May May Ali says she talked to her father Sunday morning on the phone and he was fine. She says he was watching the Super Bowl at home in Arizona, wearing a Baltimore Ravens jersey.

"He's fine, in fact he was talking well this morning," she said in a telephone interview. "These rumors pop up every once in a while but there's nothing to them."

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The rumors were started by a report in a British tabloid quoting Ali's brother, Rahman, as saying the former heavyweight champion was near death.

He told the Sun: "My brother can't speak, he doesn't recognise me. He's in a bad way. He's very sick. It could be months, it could be days. I don't know if he'll last the summer."

Rahman, though, said he hadn't seen his brother since last summer and had no contact with the family.

The report was widely repeated on the Internet, drawing expressions of condolences on Twitter and Facebook.

Ali suffers from Parkinson's disease. Last month, he celebrated his 71st birthday with friends and family by watching a video of his "Rumble in the Jungle" win over George Foreman in Africa

[baileycccc]

Unless you lived in the years of Ali reign, you cannot understand what a maverick he was. No one, I mean no one could hold a candle next to him. He was the original showman and he invented "trash talking". He always put on a show but he, like others, did not know when to get out of the ring. But his tragedy health can not dim his greatness. To quote Ali, He is the "Greatest of All Time".

[Aussie_convict]

"Friendship is the hardest thing in the world to explain. It's not something you learn in school. But if you haven't learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven't learned anything."

"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing."

"Go to College,
Stay in school,
If they can make penicillin out of mouldy bread,
they can sure make something out of you."


- Ali the greatest