What Muhammad Ali did for sportsmanship, Donald Trump is doing for political civility. Ali delighted in humiliating his opponents, not least the estimable Joe Frazier; Trump dumped on Little Marco, Lyin’ Ted, and Low-Energy Jeb. Ali claimed to be “the greatest,” the Trump assures us that he will be “the greatest jobs president God ever created.” Ali was “pretty” he told us; Trump says he has a big staff.

From the same generation as Ali and Trump, I have a difference conception of greatness, one that Lou Gehrig or Arthur Ashe better typify. They were more modest about the gifts that good genes and good fortune afforded them.

Whether Ali was indeed the greatest – greatest boxer, that is – is arguable. Beyond the difficulty of comparing sports figures from different eras (Jack Johnson, Joe Lewis, and Rocky Marciano are certainly worthy of consideration), there seems to be a natural prejudice to view such comparisons from a current day perspective.

But if one were to make such cross generation judgments, I would be hard pressed to name Ali greatest athlete of the 20th century – not above Jim Thorpe, Jesse Owens, Jim Brown, or Pele. (If one were to compare across genders as well as across time, Babe Didrikson Zaharias would be a worthy contender.)

Muhammad Ali was no doubt a great boxer, maybe the greatest ever, but if so, then Joe Frazier, who beat Ali once and lost two other close bouts to him, was a close second. Ali’s treatment of Frazier outside the ring – calling him ugly, an Uncle Tom, and a gorilla – diminishes Ali, not Frazier, in my view.

Donald Trump has followed a similar pattern of personal abuse in his march through the Republican primaries and into his campaign against Democrat Hillary Clinton. Presidential campaigns have always been rock-em, sock-em affairs, but Trump seems to be taking things to a new level of ugly.

As stupid and as crooked as his opponents may be, he assures us he is that smart and that righteous. Like Ali, Trump promotes his brand with no sign of having learned that, as my grandmother used to remind us, self-praise stinks.