The baseball world remembers Muhammad Ali
Muhammad Ali passed away Friday night at the age of 74, prompting an outpouring of tributes from all corners of the sporting world. Here’s just a small sample of the ways in which Major League Baseball, its teams and its players, chose to memorialize Ali on social media Friday night.
Major League Baseball’s twitter account, @MLB, acknowledged Ali’s passing with this Vine of Ali letting that old fire shine through with a little shadow boxing before throwing out the first pitch of the 2004 All-Star Game in Houston:
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The All-Star Game account, @AllStarGame, added this gif of Ali turning those quick hands on a very entertained Derek Jeter during the same pre-game ceremonies:
The Astros themselves tweeted the classic overhead photograph by Sports Illustrated’s Neil Leifer of Ali having knocked down Cleveland Williams in 1966, which was taken from one of the catwalks at the Astrodome, which had opened the previous year:
The Braves remembered Ali with an image of his lighting of the Olympic torch in Atlanta in 1996 in what would become Turner Field the following year:
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Hank Aaron, one of the few living athletes in Ali’s class as both an all-time great and a figure of societal importance, added these heartfelt words:
Though they tweeted it in December, that tweet from Aaron necessitates inclusion of this image of Aaron and Ali in their primes from sometime between 1969–1971, shared by @DugoutLegends:
The Dodgers created a video laying Vin Scully’s on-air announcement of Ali’s death over a still image of Jackie Robinson visiting Ali in training in the 1960s:
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The Rockies tweeted a video of Drew Goodman’s on-air announcement of Ali’s death from Friday night’s broadcast:
During that game, the Padres announced Ali’s death to the Petco Park crowd by filling their scoreboard with Leifer’s legendary image of Ali standing over a knocked-out Sonny Liston in their 1965 rematch:
The Giants remembered Ali by tweeting a picture of Ali with Willie Mays and hitting coach Hensley Meulens during a recent visit to the ballpark:
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The Marlins tweeted a picture of an Ali quote engraved on a plaque in their clubhouse:
The Cubs tweeted video of Ali in the booth with Ernie Banks during “Take Me Out To The Ball Game” that appears to be from sometime last decade:
The Angels tweeted an image of Dave Parker sparing with Ali in the Angels clubhouse in 1991:
The Yankees tweeted three images of Ali at Yankee Stadium, two from his visit to the new stadium in 2009, and a promotional image of Ali and Ken Norton in the renovated Yankee Stadium before their fight there in 1976.
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The Brewers remembered Ali with video of his visit to spring training in 2011, courtesy of MLB.com beat writer Adam McCalvy:
Former Brewer Carlos Gomez added this image of himself with Ali from that visit on his Instagram account:
The Reds tweeted an image of their players with Ali prior to the 2009 Civil Rights Game:
Recently retired utility man Willie Bloomquist tweeted this image of himself and several other Royals, including a young Alex Gordon, with Ali, sporting a Royals batting practice jersey, from either 2009 or 2010:
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Hall of Famer Dave Winfield tweeted this image of himself with Ali:
In addition to the above, countless players tweeted some sort of tribute to Ali, many including the famous Liston image, some including a famous Ali quote. Andrew McCutchen, Brett Lawrie, and Cameron Rupp went the extra mile by laying inspirational Ali quotes over images from that fight:
Finally, Steve Jones of the Louisville Courier-Journal filed this story on Saturday afternoon on what was perhaps Ali’s closest connection to baseball, his support of the his hometown University of Louisville Cardinals, for whom Ali’s son Asaad played from 2009 to 2012 and for whom Ali and his wife Lonnie created the Muhammad Ali Leadership Baseball Scholarship just this year.
