Longtime boxing ring announcer Michael Buffer has made a nice living out of his five-word catchphrase, "Let's get ready to rumble!"
He revealed in a video interview with SINow.com that the impetus for his famous call that has transcended boxing and has become a household term in the sports world in general is an athlete whose own fame was enhanced by his words.
Muhammad Ali.
"I tried, 'Man your battle stations," Buffer said. " 'Ladies and gentlemen, fasten your seatbelts.' ... Crickets were out there it was really bad. ... The great, the greatest, Muhammad Ali, used to say (imitating Ali) 'I'm pretty. I'm so pretty, I'm ready to rumble! Rumble, young man ...'
"And so that line was out there with the word, 'Rumble.' And so I started to say, 'Let's get ready to rumble' - not with the enthusiasm you hear today because I wasn't sure. But it kind of had a little bit of a feeling, and I stayed with it. I got advice how to say it better here and there. So it is what you hear today. It gets the crowd up and that's how I introduced the two stars of the show because they deserve it."
If Ali provided the words, it was Buffer, himself a big sports fan, who saw a need to regenerate interest once the fighters entered the ring.
He said that when the boxers would come from the dressing room to the ring, the arena had an electricity to it. Music and fireworks often accompanied that entrance, whipping the crowd into a frenzy.
"Then the ring announcer has to suddenly kill the crowd, Buffer said.
It was the announcer's job to introduce the venue, and then recognize the presidents or key figures of the boxing body that brought the fight together - the World Boxing Association or the World Boxing Council, for example.
The judges, state executive director, chairman of the boxing commission, the doctors also received introductions, Buffer said, and that wiped out the energy.
"I wanted to bring it back to a little bit of a level of excitement," he said. He envisioned firing up the crowd the way Mary Hulman George, the former head of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, used to tell the Indianapolis 500 drivers, "Gentlemen, start your engines."
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