And, the winner is Ali. For 1966

Ring Magazine has made Muhammad Ali its 1966 Fighter of the Year, half century after refusing to give him the award because he disapproved of the Vietnam War draft and his ties to the Nation of Islam.

The boxing magazine said it was righting a wrong by retroactively naming the late heavyweight great as the best fighter of 1966.

“Editors at that time obviously felt strongly Ali, while succeeding in the ring, didn’t meet other criteria deemed important,” said editorin-chief Michael Rosenthal. “But we can see the injustice by today’s standards, even if we take issue with some things Ali said and did.”

Ali won all five of his fights in 1966 in impressive fashion. He was at the peak of his career, which was soon to be interrupted for three years while he fought courts over his refusal to be drafted. But the magazine declined to name a fighter of the year for only the second time, saying Ali — who Ring called by his former name, Cassius Clay — didn’t meet the award’s moral criteria.

“Most emphatically is Cassius Clay, of Louisville, Ky., not to be held up as an example to the youngsters of the United States,” wrote Dan Daniel, a co-founder of the magazine, at the time.

Ali would later have his conscientious objector status upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, and resumed fighting in 1970. He was named Ring’s fighter of the year in 1972, 1974, 1975 and 1978 along with his original award in 1963.

Ali died in June at age 74, after years of battling Parkinson’s.