Why is Sugar Ray Leonard ranked so much higher than Hagler all-time?

Established himself over multiple weight classes. Multiple wins over Duran, including one over Duran at a far more comfortable weight for Roberto then Hagler met him at.

Leonard eking by Hagler in their fight?

 

I have them pretty close to each other Carles. Mind you I think Hagler narrowly edged out Leonard, and that he clearly and easily beat Roberto Duran and Vito Antuofermo, beliefs which not everyone holds. I suppose if one doesn't hold those beliefs, then it's hard to have them close to each other.

Ray is above Hagler all time p4p for me of course.

 

My opinion is that it's Hagler's own high standing that hurts him in this- being at worst, a top 10 middleweight, and consequently losing to a semi-retired welterweight (even if it was Sugar Ray) moving up in weight, the smaller man gets more credit even if Marvin wasn't prime, either. A great middleweight losing to a great welterweight almost always swings the "who ranks higher" meter towards the smaller man.

Also, Ray proved he could be successful in multiple weight classes after proving his greatness in one- another thing people look for early when ranking fighters. While I think he's properly credited for dominating the class, Marvin's stranglehold on the middleweight division was simultaneously a blessing and a curse because unless a fighter was moving up like Hearns, Duran, and Leonard did, it was hard for anyone to become successful enough to be considered a natural rival for him. The trio that jumped through weight classes had the benefit of already having a champ in place they could go after to validate their spots. That Marvin faced "just contenders" outside of that trio leads to competition concerns- which, if you notice, linger around any long reigning champion- from Joe Louis to Larry Holmes to Hopkins to Calzaghe. Had Hagler got beat while he was on top of his game, people might rate his competition higher, strange as that sounds. The other 3 really established themselves (lightweight for Duran, light middle for Hearns, and welterweight for Ray) in one class, than moved up. Hagler did the first, but never the second. We never got to see him become a super middleweight or light heavyweight, and fair or not, that plays into it too.

Finally, I do think Ray faced and beat better competition- better versions of Duran and Hearns, Benitez, and Hagler himself in particular.

Just my 2 cents on it. :thumbsup

 

He faced better competition, his multi-weight success is superior to Hagler's one weight dominance, and I felt he deserved the win in their fight.

I also feel that Ray at his best was a superior all-around fighter, but only by a small margin and that's less significant anyway.


Leonard is top 15 for me, Marvin is top 35 or so. It seems like a wide margin but for me personally there is little seperating a lot of the fighters between them.

 

On most lists, I really don't think he's ranked that much higher.

Let's say he's above him by around 10-15 spots. It may sound like a lot, but in the whole scheme of things with so many great fighters throughout history, that's actually pretty close.

I don't have any list but I'm inclined to think that I'd have Leonard and Hagler pretty close. I've never seen Hagler's draw with Seales, nor his loss to Monroe, I've read that the Monroe loss was fair. The loss to Watts was a bad decision IMO, I had Hagler winning clearly, and I had him drawing with Leonard and winning the Antufermo draw.

Assuming the Seales draw and Monroe loss are fair, and there were no other wins that he had that could've been a loss or draw, my own record of Hagler's fights is 64-1-2.

 

I rate Marvin Hagler higher.

I dont understand the degrees of glory people attach to "multi-weight success".
Sure, Leonard going up to beat a fighter as great as Hagler for the genuine middleweight championship is an immense achievement (I actually thought Hagler edged it but still ...) but beating guys like Ayub Kalule and Don Lalonde for crappy titles at other weights is relatively meaningless.

Leonard was welterweight champion from 1979 to 1982 but lost it temporarily during that time to Duran. His wins over Benitez and Hearns and the return with Duran do establish him as one of the great welterweights, and the fight with Hagler re-inforces and enhances his greatness but I think there's a lot to be said for defending against all-comers over a period of time in a string of defences. Truth is, Leonard lost the welterweight crown the first time he faced a great challenger, and while he beat Hearns well in an epic super-fight, I think it would have been interesting to see him hold the title for a few years with challengers like Donald Curry coming up, or a rematch with Hearns. There were some good welters coming through. And if he had successfully defended against a half-dozen of them he'd certainly be up there above Hagler. But I dont take it as a given that Leonard was that superior. As I said, he lost to Duran first time out.

I feel Hagler's reign and opposition are underrated. He obliterated Hearns, who had just annhiliated Duran. And very few of Hagler's challengers were genuine "soft touches". There were some BIG middleweights in those days (before the 168 division became accepted), and Hagler - despite his muscularity and strength - wasn't a big-boned guy at middleweight. Yet he appeared as Godzilla against a lot of these guys, and some people just like to rememeber that he fought a few guys who were coming up in weight. Truth is, he took on a good crop of genuine middlewights, tough young challengers. Beat them all. People would like to some "great" middleweights on his resume, but no one coming up in that era 1980-85 had a chance to become a great middleweight with Hagler holding the fort. Sugar Ray Leonard was waiting for him to slow down before challenging him - and if Hagler had destroyed ANY version of Leonard (1982, '83, '87) he'd get no credit anyway from his critics at least. Guys like Don Curry were waiting for Hagler to get old, Mike McCallum wasn't a huge draw. He faced strong and decent middleweight opposition - Hamsho, Roldan, Obelmejias, Antuofermo, Minter. Outboxed Duran, crushed Hearns, and I thought he did enough to beat a masterful and inspired Leonard in his final fight.

Marvin Hagler is among the very best and most accomplished fighters I've seen in my lifetime. Equal to anyone in the last 30 years.

 

Very interesting post with some great points. I also tend to view long term dominance of a weight class as a definite mark of quality (greatness). There seems to be a number of people (majority) on the Classic board who take the opposite view and see succesful division jumping as paramount.

When you dominate a division you have far less freedom to pick who you fight. At some point you have to face the very best, and in someone like Hagler's case, you face the very best your division has to offer, repeatedly. The thing about moving up, as a challenger, you can pick and choose whose crown you want to take. Should SRL, as a multi weight champ, really get major props for taking the light middle crown from Kalule, or the supermiddle/light heavy titles from Lalonde?

I'm not questioning Leonard's qualities here, just stating the case for consistent champions versus weight jumpers. I'm far more impressed with what Leonard achieved at welter than anything else he did outside of the weight. His wins against Benitez, Duran and Hearns eclipse anything he achieved subsequently, which were all against weak or faded opposition.

 

I scored the fight for Leonard, so on my card he won more rounds. It was however very close and a decision that can be easily debated. The reason why it plays a significant part in comparing them is even if Hagler was faded, which he clearly was, Leonard was coming off 3 years of inactivity and only fought once in 5 years, looking rather poor in the process. His performances after Hagler indicate that he was clearly faded himself. In his first fight at 160lbs, he beat Hagler, who was expected to trounce him with little difficulty. It's a very big win IMO.

Leonard proved himself the best at 147, then picked up titles at other weights. Kalule was at least as good as any of the fighters at 154 at the time outside of Benitez whom Leonard had already beaten, he was an excellent fighter and Ray stopped him. Hagler was the king at 160 when Ray beat him. You can put whatever meaning you want on the knockout of LaLonde, but it has some significance given the stage of Leonard's career and the performance.

I give Leonard more credit for his wins that proved himself the best at 147 and the wins through the weights than Hagler reigning as champion of one division for 7 years, defending against guys who moved up in Hearns, Duran, and Mugabi, and contenders in Sibson, Hamsho, Roldan, Scypion, and the likes of Caveman Lee and Obelmejias.

I think Hagler fought everyone that mattered at 160 during his reign. As for him moving up in weight, the SMW division was not established during his reign, so he would have had to gone up to 175lbs. I would probably favor some of the top contenders at 175 over him, and see no chance at all of him beating Spinks.


In the big areas of ranking fighters (resume, overall achievements, and how their fight against each other went), Leonard clearly holds the edge over Hagler.

 

Agreed. Fair and balanced opinion.

 

Just my 2p on those questions...

1) Leonard picked up a couple of "cheap" titles in Lalonde and Kalule, although Kalule was a pretty good fighter at 154.

2) Until the last couple of years of his reign, when he had paydays against Hearns/ Mugabi/ Leonard, Hagler always fought the top men and/or his mandatories. They were a solid but unspectacular bunch, however thats not Haglers fault.

3) Hagler would have struggled if he'd moved up in weight IMHO, he was a short middleweight and there was no 168 division so it was straight to Lt Heavyweight where a prime 6'2" Micheal Spinks was waiting.

 

Brainwashed fanatics, and ignorance on the part of the half educated. it simply is not valid to rank Ray Leonard over a true great like Hagler. In fact, it's absurd when you really think about it.

I personally never bought into it myslef. I would and did watch Hagler fight live but would never waste my money on a Leonard fight. How I hated him and rejoiced when Terrible Terry taught him a lesson so painful and embarrassing that the world will never forget it. It totally took away his bragging rights as an all time great.

I believe he was a fraud because from the start the way his career was run and carefully planned out. I personally dont believe the retina injury ever existed because of the way he revived his career in his old age. Who does that?

let's face it, you dont have 7 fights risking your eye sight when you have 50 million in the bank.

as for Opposition, Hagler trumps leonard. I dare someone, anyone to prove me worng. It wasnt Leonard that faced a prime Hearns or leonard that was duking it out with Roldan and Hamsho. I dont think ray could last with those two.

There's a lot of people that Leonard could have faced but didnt. he didnt fight Nunn or Jackson or McCallum. I would have loved to see that instead of Uno mas. And lets face it-nobody really cared about Lenarrd-Hearns 2. Not in 1989 they didnt.

As for the multiple title thing, it's really worthless accomplishment. What good is moving up and beating lalonde for 2 titles then dropping back down at 154 and getting your butt kicked by Norris? it just proves you can beat a bigger guy if you can find someone lame enough (no offense to lalonde) to fight which, Leonard always seemed to be able to do

No offense to Leonard fans either but he was lucky that lalonde was born and happened to be holding a title at the time.

I rank Hagler top ten easy and Leonard down in the lower 40s somewhere

 

Red, you must be the only boxing fan, either pro or anti, that judges Leonards career by the Norris fight.

 

describe what these solid but unspectacular bunch resembled. I doubt that more than a few of us got a good look at them