I wasn’t a boxing fan until Muhammad Ali came along. And I’m not one now that he’s gone.

Like his fellow boxer Kris Kristofferson’s “Pilgrim,” Ali was “a walkin’ contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction.” Richard Pryor, who went a few rounds with him, said he was “so fast you don’t see his punches till they comin’ back.” Lord, was he fun to watch, and to listen to.

Some considered him a braggart, but it ain’t braggin’ if you can do it. And it’s one of sport’s greatest tragedies that he kept on doing it after he was no longer The Greatest.

His sting is gone. May he float like a butterfly.