Is Sugar Ray Leonard divisive amongst boxing fans?

Well put MM but it's also true that a great many cannot shake off the negativity you speak of and fully embrace Ray the ATG boxer.

 

Excellent point. Beating so many elite and well favoured fighters - Ray def. invited the wrath of the opposing fans.

Re point 1). Montreal - I must say, one of the most positive, outstanding, credit worthy, losing efforts ever. In that frame, similar to Ali’s performance in FOTC.

You got the feel (or at least I did) that a return match was going to see a somewhat different complexion and outcome - and that most improvements seen would come from Ray’s corner, not Roberto’s.

Suffice to say, while nigh impossible for Duran to be any better than he was in Montreal (a great example of an absolutely acute peak performance embedded in a boxer’s prime) there was reasonable scope for Leonard himself to improve and be that much more effective.

Roberto wasn’t stupid - I believe he understood this also which may or may not have compromised his prep for the rematch. He climbed the mountain once with all he had - and it was still a close fight - hard to pump up and do it again.

 

Well - JT - as you will know, much better than most, I am far less enamored with Leonard, as a character (despite, once upon a time, being a super-fan). But, to deny how exceptional he was as a boxer, would just be plain daft.

To this day, I still enjoy watching his fights back and I still consider Leonard/Hearns (I) to be one of the greatest fights ever.

 

Yeah we had a couple of friendly go rounds!!!

Good stuff old mate.