Personally I could never stand him.. He seems to inject his opinions and political agenda into everything... I also found him to be very condesending when speaking to fighters, I specifically remember a ESPN sit down he did with Larry Holmes , and Bert kept talking like HE was the boxing expert and Holmes was just there just to be there
When Holmes talks about boxing he doesn`t seem to know much, but Sugar once said Carnera would have beaten Wlad and Vitali!
I used to read Boxing Illustrated in the early 90`s and it introduced me to the golden era of boxing and get nostalgic feelings when I think of Sugar, because I associate him and his pic with that era, but a lot of that era and the decades after are overrated compared to elite fighters today, so I have mixed feelings about Sugar and some of the fanatic support for old time fighters, despite a lot of them being fantastic at the same time, I don`t thin k Sugar really knew much about boxing, but he was a brilliant historian and very charismatic speaker.
I liked him a lot. Has the pleasure of meeting him at a few fights in Vegas over the years too and he was very friendly. An awesome guy to talk to.
I gave him some respect for his defense of James Douglas, after the outrageous attempts to cheat him out of the title, by Don King and some of the sanctioning bodies.
I got made respect for him, but it's based on perspective. He was & is different from every sports commentator I've listened/watch in that he wasn't just up to date on the current athletes. Stephen A Smith, Max Kellerman and most...I think..LOL....couldn't go back to the days of Jerry West, Bill Russell & name their team mates, competitive teams, coaches in the NBA. That's my perspective of Bert Sugar. He knew his history. Chief second, cut men, climate surrounding big fights. That's where I draw the line. Never really listened to who he thought was the best. & I do remember him pissing off Holmes stating that Ali had been taking a type of pill that made him look like he was in shape. BUT, it was the truth. Now would it had matter if Ali hadn't taken it? Probably he would've looked out of shape while getting whooped as opposed to looking in shape and getting whooped by Holmes. Last I saw of Sugar, around 2008, he knew the fighters of our era, going back to bare-knuckle in England. if Bert were an NFL football so-called historian, he would've been able to tell you about Earl Curly Lambeau & how he got a loan from the Indian meat packing company that became the acme packing...giving birth to the Green Bay Packers. then work his way up to Tom Brady & Aaronn Rodgers of today. Sugar taught me so much about Tex Rickard & how his relationship with a dude named McMahon Sr...whose son became the face of american wrestling. & How wild west legend Wyatt Earp once refereed a boxing match. It was because of Sugar that I stopped thinking Dempsey was racist to the point of not wanting to fight a black champ. It was his promoter Rickard's bad experience with Jack Johnson winning that prevented him from making it happen. Now was it true? Well there aren't any boxing gurus today to challenge the theory. SO RIP Bert Sugar the cigar smoking, plaid & checker pants wearing braggart.
He was extremely charismatic, I always enjoyed hearing him speak, even if he was wrong on certain things. For an example, he said Walcott, Louis, Charles and Moore averaged an age of 40 when Marciano fought them... Yet none were 40, with Ezzard being 32. Of course, there's also the carnera vs wlad comment, but I feel like that one was out of anger and exaggeration because of the boring fight. All in all, a man ingrained in the history of boxing, whether you agreed with him or not.
There is a story that one boxing writer said to another "have you ever seen Bert without his fedora?" The other writer related this to Sugar ,who arranged for the questioner to come to his hotel room and wait for him while he got ready for a social gig.The guy duly turned up and Bert shouts from the shower ," come in,the doors open". The fella comes in and waits for Bert to appear,after a couple of minutes Bert comes out of the shower,towel around his waist ,wearing his fedora and nothing else.