ferdiepacheco.com       "The Fight Doctor"

Although other books have been written about Muhammad Ali, none can match Muhammad Ali: A View from the Corner, the intensely personal memoir by the man who was the champ's personal doctor for most of Ali's long career.

In the mid-sixties, Dr. Ferdie Pacheco maintained a clinic in the Miami area known as "Overtown."  One of his patients was a handsome fighter named Cassius Clay.  Clay had won a gold medal in the 1960 Olympics, and Pacheco became part of the boxer's corner when Clay defeated Sonny Liston for the Heavyweight Championship of the World.

As part of Ali's entourage, Pacheco knew the young fighter personally and became especially close with his trainer, Angelo Dundee.  In Muhammad Ali: A View from the Corner, the doctor examines Ali's entire career-from his early victories, his membership in the Black Muslim brotherhood, and his suspension from boxing due to his refusal to serve in the Vietnam War ("I got nothing against those Vietcong") to his return to the ring and his emergence as Muhammad Ali, the Champion of Champions.

Pacheco was a insider from the beginning, and his views on Ali's family, friends and lovers are fresh and revealing.  The book is peppered throughout with on-the-scene sketches and rare photographs from his personal collection.