Muhammad Ali^†

A stolen Schwinn bicycle is the reason any of this happened. At 12, Cassius Clay reported the theft to a Louisville police officer who also ran a boxing gym; the officer pointed him toward training. By 18 he had Olympic gold from Rome. By 22 he had the heavyweight title, having beaten Sonny Liston as a massive underdog in February 1964. Two days after the fight, he announced he'd joined the Nation of Islam, which was not the kind of post-match press conference boxing was used to. Within two weeks he had a new name. The title win and that announcement together rewired what a Black athlete could say in public.

The boxing career ended up being almost secondary to what he refused to do. In 1967, he declined induction into the Vietnam draft three times in the same morning. His boxing license was suspended that day, his title stripped, and he didn't fight for 43 months. The exile cost him what should have been his prime years. The Supreme Court overturned his conviction unanimously in 1971. He won the heavyweight title twice more after the exile, becoming the first to win it three times. His 1996 Olympic torch lighting, visibly trembling from Parkinson's, turned an international broadcast into something that felt like a eulogy delivered while he was still alive.

The 1960 Olympic gold medal ended up in the Ohio River. He reportedly threw it there after being refused service at a Louisville restaurant, and collected a replacement at the 1996 Atlanta Games. During the 43 months he couldn't box, he starred in a Broadway musical called Buck White that closed after 7 performances. In November 1990, he flew to Baghdad to meet with Saddam Hussein personally and came back with 15 American hostages. For a man defined by the ring, he spent a striking amount of time not in it.

An Islamic Jenazah service at Louisville's Freedom Hall drew more than 14,000 people; the venue had hosted his first professional fight 55 years earlier. At the funeral procession, Will Smith, who played him in the 2001 film, carried the coffin alongside Lennox Lewis and family members. Bill Clinton delivered the eulogy. Louisville reported zero violent crimes in the 8 days following his death.