Grady and the Champ

On March 13, 1963, Cassius Clay defeated Doug Jones at Madison Square Garden. In what was later dubbed the Fight of the Year by Ring Magazine, Clay won by a 5-4 decision after a grueling 11 rounds. The crowd, which overwhelmingly favored Jones, booed as Clay held his arms up in victory. He, in turn, faced the crowd and booed back at them. Grady Ponder saw the fight on television in Miami. He watched ecstatically as Clay told reporters: "I hope Sonny Liston is watching this. And when I get back to Miami, I want that bum." In his idol's eyes, Ponder saw his own future.

On June 21, 1966, Ponder fought a much-touted main event at the Miami Beach Auditorium against a Cuban-born slugger named Jesus Hernandez, who had knocked out nearly every one of the nine opponents he had faced. Ponder was no slugger; he drew the fight out to a decision that was awarded, unanimously, in his favor. "There are those who insist lightweight Grady Ponder is the best young prospect to tote boxing leather in the Beach arena since the sport came to town," wrote the Sun Sports. "Ponder ... seems to hunger for more action — and more talented opposition."

Despite his successes, Ponder was growing increasingly frustrated with the fights — or the lack thereof — he was getting. The wait between bouts was sometimes two, three, four months. The fights Goodman did arrange were often outside the country — Trinidad, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas — where decisions inevitably went to the home boxer. "The reasons I was going out of town for all those fights is that those were the only kinds of fights Mac could get," he reflects.

Meanwhile, for the first since he came to Miami, Ponder was beginning to think about more than boxing. During the time he had lived with Clay, he had been oblivious to the change taking place in his idol, even as it happened quietly before his eyes, in those late-night sessions with the Koran. Even then Clay had already become involved with the Nation of Islam, but — partly at the request of his handlers — the rising star kept his beliefs to himself. But the day after he returned from defeating Liston in 1964, Clay went public with his new identity, appearing by Elijah Muhammad's side on television and announcing his new name: Muhammad Ali.

Ali's conversion to Islam didn't mean much to Ponder. But when he heard Ali would be in Miami later that year to speak at the Liberty City mosque, he went there, hoping to reunite with his idol. The last they had spoken, Ponder was a 14-year-old dropout without a plan; now he was a champion-to-be.

Ali never showed up, but Ponder politely stuck around to hear the sermon. The language moved him. "I had never heard black people talking like that before," he says. A few weeks later he returned for another meeting. In early 1965 he joined the Nation, privately renouncing his "slave name" and taking the moniker Grady X. Later he would change his name to Aleem Fakir. Publicly he still fought as Grady Ponder.

Ponder's shot for a title came November 18, 1967, against Bunny Grant, the British Commonwealth Lightweight Champion, at the National Stadium in Kingston. For the first and only time in his career, Ponder was given a warm reception abroad, largely thanks to Cecil Bustamente Campbell, better known as Prince Buster, the Jamaican ska legend. Buster met Ponder at the airport and instantly befriended him, insisting Ponder stay with him and escorting the young boxer all over the island.

Ponder says he never thought to wonder why a famous musician should take under his wing a foreign boxer who was predicted to lose to a popular national champion. In fact Prince Buster was acting on the orders of Captain Sam, then head of Mosque 29 in Miami, to which Ponder belonged. Buster, himself an ex-boxer, had joined the Nation of Islam in 1964 — like Ponder, shortly after meeting Muhammad Ali, who had personally invited him to attend a talk there.

Captain Sam was a big fan of Ali's and attended all of his Miami fights. In Ponder he saw another young "lion," another Black Muslim, devoutly religious, who appeared to be following in Ali's footsteps. He told Prince Buster to look out for Ponder and help him win.