The Big Fight Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Preface

  Chapter 1 - Palmer Park

  Chapter 2 - “My Journey Has Ended”

  Chapter 3 - From Vega to Vegas

  Chapter 4 - All the Marbles

  Chapter 5 - Manos de Piedra

  Chapter 6 - No Más

  Chapter 7 - The Showdown

  Chapter 8 - Seeing a New Future

  Chapter 9 - “I Am Back”

  Chapter 10 - Simply Marvelous

  Chapter 11 - Finding Love Again

  Chapter 12 - Peace at Last

  Acknowledgements

  INDEX

  VIKING

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  First published in 2011 by Viking Penguin,

  a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  Copyright © Ray Leonard, 2011

  All rights reserved

  Photographs courtesy of the author unless otherwise indicated.

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Leonard, Sugar Ray, 1956-

  The big fight: my life in and out of the ring / Sugar Ray Leonard with Michael Arkush

  p. cm.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-51576-1

  1. Leonard, Sugar Ray, 1956- 2. Boxers (Sports)—United States—Biography. 3. Boxing—United States. I. Arkush, Michael. II. Title.

  GV 1132. L42L46 2011

  796.83092—dc22

  [B]

  2010048905

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

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  To Bernadette,

  who taught me

  the best prizes in life

  are not won in the ring

  PREFACE

  My eyes never lie.

  They were open wide, staring back at me in the mirror of the dressing room at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Those eyes would reveal which of the two dueling personalities would enter the ring as I took on the most intimidating opponent of my career, Marvin Hagler. It was nearly seven o’clock on the night of April 6, 1987, the opening bell only about an hour away.

  Would it be Sugar Ray Leonard, the star of numerous conquests in the past, an American hero since capturing the gold medal in Montreal more than a decade earlier, the anointed heir to the throne vacated by Muhammad Ali? Sugar Ray was resilient, fearless, unwilling to accept failure. The smile and innocence of a child, which made him a hit on TV, would be gone, replaced in the ring by a man filled with rage he did not understand, determined to cause great harm to another.

  Or would it be Ray Leonard, the part-time boxer at the age of thirty, whose best was well behind him, his days and nights wasted on fights that never made the headlines, fights he lost over and over, to alcohol and cocaine and depression? This was a man full of fear and self-pity, blaming everyone but the person most responsible for his fate—himself.

  In the room, with no one around, I kept my eyes glued on the eyes in the mirror. They were alive, probing, big, like flashlights. I looked at the muscles in my shoulders, my arms. They were cut, defined, powerful.

  I began to slowly shadowbox, watching my legs, then my eyes, back to my legs, then my eyes again. Pow! Pow! Pow! Pow! I threw a left, a right, another left, another right. Sweat dripped down my forehead, my breathing heavier.

  There was a knock at the door to let me know it was time. I didn’t say a word. I took one last look at my eyes. I recognized them. They were Sugar Ray’s.

  I walked out. Surrounded by my trainer, Angelo Dundee, bodyguard James Anderson, brothers Roger and Kenny, and about a dozen others, I started the familiar procession down the aisle, a strange and special ritual unlike any other in sports, cheered on by the hungry masses out for blood, marching toward glory or shame or, worse, death. During the several minutes it took to reach the ropes, I remained unscathed, as did Hagler, our bodies honed from months of sparring and running to be ready for this one momentous night. Soon we would be unscathed no more, both forced to pay the dues for the brutal profession we had chosen, or, as many of us in the Sweet Science prefer to believe, had chosen us.

  I proceeded as slowly as possible, savoring the feelings I had not experienced in almost three years, since I defeated Kevin Howard and retired again, this time, I assumed, for good. Howard, nowhere near the fighter I was, knocked me to the canvas in the fourth round. I got up right away, more humiliated than hurt, and summoned enough will to prevail in the ninth. But my heart was not in the fight game anymore, and if one is not committed, disaster is certain to strike. Lacking the motivation wasn’t a problem against Hagler. From the moment I decided in the spring of 1986 to take him on, I was sure of one thing: I wanted to tear the man apart.

  The odds were heavily against me, and why wouldn’t they be? Boxing was filled with proud warriors who came out of retirement only to discover that they should have stayed away forever, their skills never the same after the long layoff, the saddest example being the legendary Joe Louis, the hero to my father and millions of African Americans, beaten eventually by a much younger Rocky Marciano in 1951. I knew I would be assuming the same risk as the others before me, and not only to my body. At stake at Caesars was something just as important—my reputation. When I first retired as a pro in 1982, I prided myself on being the rare exception in my sport, the fighter wise enough to get out before it became too late. If I was whipped by Hagler, a very real possibility—he hadn’t lost in eleven years—I would join the long list of disgraced exchampions, leaving one lasting, pathetic image for the public I worked endlessly to impress.

  Over the previous five years, I spent less than twenty-seven minutes in the ring while Hagler took on eight opponents (fifty-seven rounds) during the same period. While I trained more vigorously for Hagler than for any prior opponent—I sparred for well over two hundred rounds—no amount of effort on the speed bag, the heavy bag, jumping rope, and running could compare to an actual
fight against a man coming from the opposite corner whose prime objective is to inflict as much damage as is humanly possible. My sparring partners never let up. They had careers they were hoping to build.

  In training camp at Hilton Head, South Carolina, I felt in control of myself and the surroundings. There was a plan I stuck to every day. On fight night in Las Vegas, I felt in control again, but didn’t know if the plan would work. A fighter never knows till the bell rings.

  There was also the injury to my left eye, which had led to the initial retirement. The official diagnosis was a partially detached retina, which could have left me, if the doctors did not operate as soon as they did, blinded in that eye for life.

  The possibility of reinjuring the eye was on my mind during the Howard bout and in the months leading up to the encounter with Hagler. What if I thought about the eye again, if for only an instant, during the fight itself? Marvin Hagler was no Kevin Howard. He said if I was “foolish” enough to take him on, he was “foolish enough to rip” my eye out. He meant it.

  Hagler’s bravado didn’t frighten me, though it did get to my family, who were already alarmed enough to begin with. They never actually came out and shared their concerns for my safety, yet I saw the look in their eyes, just as I saw it among the members of my camp. They were afraid I might get seriously hurt. Nobody was more ferocious during the 1980s than Hagler. In 1981, he gave Mustafa Hamsho such a thorough pounding that he required fifty-five stitches to plug the cuts in his skin.

  Perhaps more worried than anyone were members of the Nevada State Athletic Commission, which held jurisdiction over the bout. Not every state gave a license to a fighter with a detached retina. If my eye suffered permanent damage, the commissioners, picked by the governor, would be the ones dealing with the fallout. To protect itself, the commission asked me to take one final exam. I wasn’t crazy about the burning sensation caused by the drops the doctors put in my eyes to dilate them, but I agreed. I had come too far over the past eleven months to let the opportunity slip away. I passed the exam. The fight was on.

  It was just after eight P.M. As the challenger, I was the first to climb under the ropes.

  Wearing a short, Elvis-style white jacket, I received a warm reception from the fans and enjoyed every second of it. Life after boxing can be rewarding in many ways, but nothing comes close to the sound of applause, and any ex-fighter who claims he doesn’t miss it is lying. Hagler was next, starting his procession down the aisle, the familiar scowl planted firmly on his face, accompanied by “War,” the anti–Vietnam War anthem from the late sixties.

  What was he thinking? Did this most macho of fighting men have any doubts of his own? Did he worry about a different Hagler showing up on this, the most important night of his career? We all attempt to hide what’s most vulnerable about us. Perhaps Hagler’s fierceness was related to something equally frightened within the man himself.

  At first, Hagler wasn’t sure about fighting me. After I went public in May 1986 with my decision to challenge him, he took several months to offer his response.

  What did Hagler need to prove? He owned the middleweight belt and was recognized by the press and fans as the toughest pound-for-pound fighter on the planet. What else could he possibly gain by beating a has-been like me? On the other hand, he could lose everything and perhaps never get a chance to redeem himself. Yet what Hagler did not own was true stardom, and the only way he could attain it was to expose me, in his view, for the fraud I had always been, the slick, made-for-TV package who stole the spotlight that should have been his.

  I did the commercials. I appeared on the talk shows. I made millions while Hagler, for much of his career, risked his life for thousands. These slights, as well as the promise of making at least $10 million, were why, in the summer of 1986, he accepted my challenge. He would put an end to the Sugar Ray Leonard hype machine, once and for all.

  I came up with a plan as I waited for him. Since the fight was made official I had worked on messing with Hagler’s psyche, and here was one more chance. I wanted to know which Hagler I would be facing, the invincible one or the insecure one. After he entered the ring and received his ovation, every bit as generous as mine, I slowly glided toward his general direction, shuffling my feet and shadowboxing. As I crept closer, I began to think like a choreographer on Broadway, carefully plotting my steps.

  The two of us were soon only a few feet apart, headed for a certain collision. If Hagler backed off to avoid me, I kept thinking, I would win the fight. If we bumped into each other, I would lose. He was the champion defending his turf and I was daring to take it away. It went back to the code in the hood, where the strongest person on the streets stood his ground against any threat.

  It was a matter of respect: Did Marvin Hagler respect me or not? It then dawned on me: He was not going to move. I screwed up and I was going to pay the price.

  Please fuckin’ turn, I thought. Now!

  At the last possible second, he did, darting to the side to avoid contact while I did not budge one inch. I was relieved. Hagler was mine.

  We met in the center of the ring for referee Richard Steele’s instructions. I looked down at the canvas, not at Hagler. I was in my zone and did not want to be disturbed.

  We retreated to our respective corners, soaking up the final words of wisdom from the boxing lifers who had done everything they could to prepare us for the moment, which was only seconds away. It was now up to the two of us, half-naked and half-scared, ready to kill or be killed.

  The bell rang.

  1

  Palmer Park

  My eyes didn’t lie when I was a kid, either, and what they revealed to me in the mirror when I got home on that unforgettable day was no major surprise. I was hurting. I was hurting bad. To make things worse, I needed to clean up the marks on my face before my dad, Cicero Leonard, would notice. He was a fighter in his day, and he wouldn’t think too highly of a son of his who got beat up pretty good the first time he stepped into a ring. Gaining his respect meant everything to me and it was never easy.

  I was seven or eight years old. I don’t recall exactly what inspired me to take on the skinny kid at the No. 2 Boys Club in D.C., several blocks from our small apartment on 210 L Street. Proving something to my dad, and myself, was probably the reason. Daddy didn’t talk much, but when he did, he loved to reminisce about his favorite fighter of all time, “the Brown Bomber,” Joe Louis. He talked about growing up in the town of Mullins, South Carolina, when he used to sit by the living room radio in other people’s homes—his family was too poor to purchase one—listening as Louis put away his latest victim. Louis, the undisputed world heavyweight champion from 1937 to 1949, offered black people hope that a brighter future was coming, that they wouldn’t be condemned to second-class status behind the white man forever. As the radio announcer described the action, my dad mimicked the champ’s every move, dreaming of his own glory in the ring. He loved to fight from the day he could walk.

  Besides Joe Louis, my dad’s other inspiration growing up was his father, Grandpa Bilge. How many of the stories about Grandpa are true and how many are myth I suppose I will never know, such as the time he knocked down Belle, his prized mule, with a single belt. If this really did happen, then Bilge, six feet three and 240 pounds of pure muscle, not the grandson he never met, was the best puncher in the Leonard family. After a long week of work, Bilge spent Saturday nights with his buddies, drinking home-brewed corn liquor and bragging about his strength.

  My dad, like many black kids in the Deep South, never made it out of elementary school in the early thirties. Bilge, needing every healthy hand, put him to work plowing the fields of a large farm owned by another man. My grandparents were sharecroppers, which meant they grew crops on rented land for a percentage of the farm’s production. The owner supplied the equipment and mules, and cash or credit for them to live on until the crop could be harvested. For ten hours a day, six days a week, Daddy hauled tobacco and cotton and sweet potatoes, Grandp
a Bilge keeping very close watch. If he did not do what he was told, he got a good whuppin’. Bilge would wait until Daddy was in bed, and beat him with a switch, the branch of a tree. My grandma Sally, as much as it pained her, did not object. She knew her place.

  Everybody did their share on the farm, including Grandma, all four feet two inches of her. The story goes that on the very next day after giving birth to one of her fourteen children, Sally was back in the fields.

  As exhausted as my dad was, on Sundays, his one day off, he took on any kid from the county who was courageous enough to fight him in a ring he built by himself in his front yard using plow line ropes, an oak tree, and wood-cut staves, narrow strips of wood forming the sides. He sometimes fought as many as three or four fights, with few interruptions. After he put away the competition, which he did without much difficulty, he was cleaned up by Grandma and ready for another Sunday ritual, church.

  I absorbed one blow after another that afternoon at the No. 2 Boys Club. I didn’t quit, just as my dad wouldn’t, searching for any openings to make the skinny kid feel the same pain I did. It didn’t happen. I didn’t land a single hard blow, while he kept connecting with lefts and rights I never saw. My head was pounding. My legs were burning. Blood was pouring from my nose. Mercifully, the slaughter ended. I was no son of Cicero Leonard. Fortunately, Daddy didn’t notice the damage on my face, nor did any of my five siblings, and after healing from the wounds, I returned to the much safer world of comic books, in which the good guys prevailed over the forces of evil.

  In 1941, war came and Daddy spent three and a half years in the navy, working as a cook. He expected to be sent overseas. He never was, stationed instead in Maryland and Florida. Being in the service was still a jarring experience for someone who had never slept a night away from home. Once he adjusted, he kept up with his favorite pastime, fighting. He lost only once in forty-seven bouts, to a fellow named Little Red from Philadelphia. Little Red didn’t carry much of a punch but he was fast with his hands and feet. Daddy, who fought at five feet nine and about 160 pounds, was no Joe Louis, and this was as good a time as any to find out.