During a recent speech, Scott LeDoux asked if anyone in his audience had ever boxed. Three people raised their hands. LeDoux, a former heavyweight contender who fought Muhammad Ali, George Foreman and nine other world champions, responded, "I'll speak slowly for the rest of you."
Occasionally, the Anoka County commissioner looked toward the ceiling, tilting his head left, then right, as if gazing at imaginary birds circling above.
"It's what people expect of a fighter who maybe took too many blows to the head," LeDoux said later.
With LeDoux, expect the unexpected. But forget the stereotypes.
LeDoux has gone toe to toe with boxing's legends, stood up this year to a reprimand by Gov. Tim Pawlenty and has been criticized for occasionally forgetting to harness his ego. He says he can be "too blatantly rude" and "too blatantly honest" to be a politician, but LeDoux, a political independent, is among the county's most influential commissioners.
"Don't underestimate him," longtime county board member Dan Erhart said recently. "He's a leader. He knows how to work with people. And he can open a lot of doors that others can't."
Sure, LeDoux, 58, likes to tell listeners that he was his freshman class president three straight years. But don't be fooled, warns his friend Bob Dolan, a Minneapolis attorney. LeDoux -- who lost his lone heavyweight title bout to Larry Holmes, in 1980, at the old Met Center in Bloomington -- has tremendous recall and a cutting wit, marvels Dolan.
According to Dolan: After LeDoux, then 34, lost his final professional fight, in 1983 to Frank Bruno, 21, in London, journalists asked LeDoux if he thought that, in his prime, he could have beaten Bruno. LeDoux responded, "When I started out, I would never have fought Bruno. I would have killed him." When the British journalists accused LeDoux of being arrogant, he told them, "When I started out, Mr. Bruno was probably 3 years old."