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Norman Mailer, who died today at 84, will be remembered mostly for books like "The Naked and the Dead," "The Armies of the Night" and "The Executioner's Song," and will be remembered hardly at all for writing about sports. But he devoted a good deal of time, especially in the 1970s, to writing about sports, and particularly to boxing generally and Muhammad Ali specifically.

Mailer's book "The Fight" may not among his greatest, but it's probably the best account ever put on paper of The Rumble in the Jungle, the 1974 fight between Ali and George Foreman. And his 1971 Life magazine article about Ali, called "Ego," was one of the selections in "The Best American Sports Writing of the Century."

Where writers today treat boxing with scorn, Mailer treated boxing with respect. No Mailer obituary is complete without mentioning his contributions to the sport.

Norman Mailer, Novelist and Chronicler of Muhammad Ali, Dead at 84 - FanHouse - AOL Sports Blog