Who is the Modern Day Boxing Historian aka (Bert Sugar) of today?

The best right now is the "Big Daddy" Steve Bunce.

"Buncey" is by far my favorite boxing "expert."

He "loves" boxing and everything that goes with it.

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Teddy Atlas is a clown who seems like he hates boxing more than he likes it. He spends 90 percent of any commentary during fights running down judges, promoters, the sport.

 

I cant stand Bunce's squeeky voice, and that sing song of his tag partner Barry Jones OMG!

 

Bunce is the king. And most people couldn't stand Sugar, either. Just like they couldn't stand Cosell.

Those are the guys you miss when they're gone. They are unique. They make events more exciting.

 

Haven't heard Bunce.

Liked Sugar in spite of myself.

Cosell was awful, and it's a shame that he globbed so many classic fights up with his commentary.

 

When Bert had Ring Magazine between the autumn of 1979 through 1983 or so, the mag was top notch. He knew to bring in great writers and had a great balance between current coverage, results from around the world, old-timers stories, and rankings by committee. It's too bad he apparently ran the magazine into the ground, financially, with lots of frivolous spending.

I don't think that qualifies him as a great historian, but he sure could put together a great boxing magazine. His version of Boxing Illustrated in the 90s was pretty good, too.

 

Would the toupee be included?

 

Only if it's literally the exact same toupee.

 

There are a lot of Bert Sugars around. Which is to say there are a lot of guys who are full of **** and like to pretend they are historians but cant actually be bothered to get to the facts about the history of the sport they profess to be expert in.

 

He didn't just run it into the ground financially this so called "historian" oversaw the absolute degradation in quality of the Ring Record book, which directly lead to its later discontinuation, by allowing all sorts of bull**** fights and other garbage into it (Goldman can take his fare share of blame for this also). This happened on Sugars watch because he didn't know jack **** about boxing history beyond the pulp fiction that has been regurgitated ad nauseum for decades, a practice he continued until his death. No, Ring experienced arguably its weakest run under Sugar's reign barring the period since the acquisition by DLH.

 

But it was under Nat Loubet's (and Johnny Ort's) watch that the ABC tourney happened and false fights were added to the Ring Record Book.

I was under the impression (thus I could be wrong) that Herb Goldman helped clean out the Ring Record Book. I had the 87/88 edition, which I think Goldman was in charge of (after Sugar was gone) and I recall that being a great resource. (I also seem to recall that Goldman elected to factor in newspaper decisions on no-decision bouts, a practice I don't agree with.)

As for the magazine itself, it took a huge leap up with the October 1979 issue (Ali cover and Sugar's first issue). Of course, after Nat Fleischer passed away in 1972, Fleischer's son-in-law Nat Loubet ran it until Sugar took over. With Loubet at the helm the magazine was graphically sloppy, contained lots of typos, and had far less content, as well as the King / ABC / Ring U.S. Championship ratings- and record-fixing debacle. Sugar fixed many of these problems.

After Sugar's departure the mag was still good, but it was thinner, had less content, and eventually withered and went into a coma for a good year or so. This time period was when the Record Book ceased publication. Stanley Weston took over in 1990 and under his watch Ring became slick (like Weston's other boxing mags) and offered less depth.

All that said, all eras of Ring are worth perusing if one has an interest in primary source, at-the-time material.

 

The Ort scandal wasn't what killed RRB. It was a black eye to be sure but under Sugar's watch Goldman had a hand and began adding all sorts of bull**** lineages and fights. Sugar wasn't an actual historian so he deferred to Goldman who had an agenda in creating these goofy narratives. I completely disagree that the magazine was good under Sugar. I think it was at its lowest point barring its current ownership. Sugar effectively killed Ring, both its reputation and as a financial institution. In the process he shamelessly and falsely rebranded himself as this old time fight beat reporter and historian which he was neither. All through the 70s and early 80s he had greasy slicked back hair and long sideburns that got replaced by his costume of a fedora and cigar. More power to him because people bought into his bull**** and believed he had been this boxing guy going way back to an era when people actually looked like that. He wasn't. He also began telling lies about being at this event, or hobnobbing with these boxing stars back in the 50s but that was all bull**** to gain credibility also. He was a fraud who told a good story and was good at promoting himself. He was no historian of any kind.

 

Colin Heart , Alan Hubbard or Alex Steedman. There's not much they don't know about the sport of boxing.

I reckon Frank Warren could hold his own with the best of them to.