What's your Opinion Of Sugar Ray Leonard?

You might be thinking of Sugar Ray Robinson, but Leonard was very good in all departments too.

 

Afraid so yeah!!! not my fav guy

 

The voice of reason, sound, sensible, and spot on... keep well.

 

You’ve already underrated him by having him as number 6 at WW.

No doubt you have Floyd above him.

Stats and all that.

 

Can you prove me wrong???

a ranking for Leonard is more than generous.

You cant put him up there with Robinson. We all know that.

He doesnt have the # defenses as Armstrong and neither can he match the achievements of Napoles.

The reason you dont see this is because you arent aware of it.

Had he wins over Curry, McCrory, Stafford, this would have boosted his standing

add to that, a win over Pryor would have helped immensely

But sadly, they are not there

Alh, what could have been

As I said, I dont underrate him, I dont overrate him

 

One of the very best to ever do it. Lacks the depth in his resumé that some other greats have due to the shortness of his career and relatively few fights compared with other ATGs.... but wins over prime Benitez (first defeat of his career), Duran (first defeat for 8 years) and Hearns (first defeat of his career) show that, at his peak, he was the real deal and was not cherry picking.

Behind the flash and winning smile beat the heart of a real fighter. Between 1979 and 1982, he was one of the very best fighters that ever lived and certainly there aren't many who look better on film than him.

And whatever you feel about the Hagler fight in terms of the result, it was a remarkable comeback by Leonard.

 

outstanding fighter. Could do anything. Dunno how anyone can say otherwise

 

Bit harsh using the Norris fight . No less so than using trevor berbick beating of ali or paul pender beating SRR

 

#6 welterweight all-time is about right, to be fair.
I know a lot of people have him as high as #2 but I think guys like SRR, Armstrong, Britton, Napoles, Gavilan might all deserve to be infront of him.
Either way, #6 in such a stacked division historically is a high ranking.

 

but realistic

I'd like to rank him higher as a welter but need more. 6 is a good number for him. Not at the very highest because of the more qualified champions vs 4 defenses for Leonard but 6 is still a good standing

Could have done a bit more at higher weights but....

there is nothing to show at 154. A win over a Kalule is hardly the stuff of Legends

there is nothing at 160

Also, I dont feel the Norris fight can in any way, nor should be compared with the Ali - Berbick fight.

Leonard did not have a trail of losses prior to the match. He showed very good movement in the Duran fight

whereas Ali began laying on the ropes as far back as 1974.

His conditioning, movement worsened in 1976, winning two questionable decisions,

no longer able to handle the top talent,

continuing on to the next year, followed by an official loss to Leon Spinks, a man with no experience past ten rounds

Two years later, facing Larry Holmes in a fight many had said he should not take

with all this erosion in evidence, it's hard to make a case for Leonard, that he was in the same condition.

He was just whipped by a better man. No shame in that but I admit, he had NOT done it all and looking back at his accomplishments, I'd say it was a good thing that Ray Leonard had decided NOT to defend his WBC middleweight title that was given to him

Had he defended against a top flight contender, let's say, a Michael Nunn, there would be no lingering doubts

 

I hope you're having fun .. it's clear that you're playing games ..

 

comparable insofar as they were clearly waaaaaaay past their respective bests. Its not fair on any fighter, to focus on their fights which are many years after their prime. You have him at 6 in the welterweights, thats cool. I dont necessarily agree with you but i do see your point and respect it. You then go on to mention heavier weights and who he should have fought, which should have no bearing on his ranking as a welterweight. Dont mean to sound pedantic either but he had 5 defences, not 4, and i think he signed to fight Stafford, one of the guys you mentioned he shouldve fought, when the retina problem arose. He also agreed, if pryor (another you mention he shouldve fought) is to be believed, to face pryor after the Stafford fight. Cant really hold that against him for not facing either (and yes, im aware of the previous lowballing of pryor ) imo.

 

Scary scary guy. I always think of him as wearing the perfect mask. But if he would take off that mask you would see something very ugly, like a predator Alien.

One of my favorite fighters.

 

Thanks

I dont know how anyone can sit there with a straight face and tell me that 500 k offer was legit

my number one gripe is, upon winning the WBC middleweight title, he said he wanted that one fight and would retire

but as we saw, that was not really intention and took a fight with lightly regarded Lalonde, a fight no one wanted to see, rather than defend against Tate/Nunn, and show the public whether the victory over Hagler was legit, or due to the fact it was strictly because he was on the decline.

If you recall, leding up to that fight, there were years of debate as to which fighter was the best and Leonard would not take that fight