| |
He began life eighty three years ago this month, May 3, as Walker Smith Jr
in the small town of Ailey,Georgia. His birthplace was one, maybe the
only, of the small town elements about the man who was known throughout
his career as "Sugar Ray". He lived large outside the ring and inside the
ropes he was the largest presence of his, or possibly, any other
generation of fighters. There have been other boxers who have appropriated
the sobriquet "Sugar Ray" throughout the years, some who have even carried
the proud name into the ring with a modicum of distinction. However, to
most knowledgeable boxing fans, "Sugar Ray" goes with Robinson the way
"Babe" goes with Ruth.
He had nearly 200 bouts in his career and won 173 of them, 109 by
knockout, but these are only the unrefined statistics of Sugar Ray's time
in the ring. Its the other elements of his record, the highlights of a
boxing career like few others, that convey the true measure of Sugar Ray
Robinson.
Sugar Ray came within a couple of rounds of becoming the second fighter,
ever, to win three championships when he wilted in the Yankee Stadium heat
trying to wrest the light heavy weight championship from Joey Maxim
(please spare me bogus contentions about latter day fighters who have won
multiple championships in an era of "alphabet titles" and "junior" weight
divisions; the fact is that Henry Armstrong is the only three time
champion in boxing).
Sugar Ray threw the best left hook ever in a boxing ring, knocking out
Gene Fullmer, to regain the middleweight championship, in Chicago in 1957.
Two days after the fight, the new champion turned 37 (bookend that left
hook with Rocky Marciano's thirteenth round right hand against Joe Walcott
in their first fight and you have the two best punches ever thrown in the
boxing ring).
In 1951, at the peak of his career, Sugar Ray, within the space of two
months lost and won back the middleweight championship in two brutal,
wonderful matches with Randy Turpin who may have been the toughest fighter
ever to come out of England (if one disputes this contention, it is only
necessary to watch a film of Turpin fighting Bobo Olson in 1953 in Madison
Square Garden and after you're done shuddering at the sheer ferocity of
those fifteen rounds, any such doubt should be erased). Turpin beat
Robinson in London when Robinson, on one of his frequent European tours,
was fighting his seventh bout in less than two months. Two months
following the London bout, in the Polo Grounds in New York, Robinson,
trailing on all scorecards, caught Turpin on the ropes in the tenth round,
and when he let him off, Turpin no longer had what Sugar Ray always
considered "his crown".
However, as great as Robinson's career was, it was the way he went out
that remains a tribute to his eminence as a fighter. Sugar Ray Robinson,
to the end, continued to step into the ring with the best boxers
available. Sure, he took some easy opponents during the early sixties,
mostly in Europe, where, if the fans were given a vote, he would have been
up for canonization. However, on the back end of his career, in his
fortieth year, he fought Paul Pender, the middleweight champion and Gene
Fullmer twice. At 41, he fought Denny Moyer, a tough as barb wire fighter,
out of Portland Oregon, twice and followed that with bouts against Ralph
Dupas and Joey Giardello (if you have to ask if these were tough guys,
well, lets just say that there were a bunch of quality fighters, at that
time, half Robinson's age, who remained quality fighters by avoiding
Moyer, Dupas and Giardello). This was a time, with but eight champions,
when not all good fighters owned titles. Robinson went out fighting most
of these guys.
His last fight, in November, 1965, was against another highly capable
boxer, a slick New Yorker named Joey Archer. The fight was in Pittsburgh,
which was on its last legs as a great fight town. The year before Archer
had beaten Dick Tiger over ten rounds in Madison Square Garden, so this
was no "walk in the park, pick up a payday" fight for Robinson. In the
next year, Archer would go fifteen rounds, twice, with Emile Griffith for
the middleweight title. Archer clearly out boxed the forty-five year old
Robinson over ten rounds, but the most shocking aspect of the fight was
that in the eighth round Archer knocked Robinson down. Archer, while a
great boxer, wasn't a puncher of any description and that knockdown, as
clear as any signpost, indicated that it was time for Sugar Ray to quit.
In a very poignant scene in the dressing room, after the bout, Miles
Davis, the musician, tears streaming down his face, told Robinson, in that
famous gravelly voice, "Sugar, it's time, man". Robinson listened and
retired the next day. That tableau was famously captured by Pete Hamill in
eight hundred perfect words that comprised a column on the back page of
the New York Post on April 13, 1989, the day after Robinson died.
I remember talking with Archer, after he retired, at a "bust out joint" he
and his brother, Jimmy, ran on the upper East Side of New York. He
recalled the Robinson bout with wide-eyed amazement, "the guy was forty
five, for God's sake. I kept thinking throughout the whole fight, what
must he have been like in his prime. Hell, if they had matched with him
when he was fighting LaMotta, Graziano and them, I woulda stood in the
dressing room". Joey Archer couldn't punch real hard, but he was a
straight thinker.
I've always thought "pound for pound" was a somewhat silly comparison of
fighters of different size, mostly a lazy invention of sportswriters, akin
to comparing fighters of different eras. To those who saw Robinson in the
ring or on "live" television, his greatness is indisputable. To those who
have heard of his exploits in the ring only on a "hearsay" basis, its
difficult, if not impossible with mere words, to convey how good Sugar
Ray was. Try this: think of the best fighter you've ever seen and then
envision the composite of the boxer who would beat that fighter. Robinson
is the guy you're creating in your mind. I'll make the case that Sugar Ray
was in a class by himself. To those who dispute that, I offer this
alternative: whatever class Sugar Ray Robinson was in, it certainly
doesn't take long to call the roll. Bernie McCoy
Other Articles by
McCoy:
|
|
Drama Without a Script...
By Bernie McCoy -April 23, 2003 Link |
|
|
Heavyweight Memories...
By Bernie McCoy -April 6, 2003
Link |
|
|
So Long, Kid -By Bernie McCoy
March 22, 2003
Link |
|
|
