It was early in the professional boxing career of Sugar Ray Robinson, a snowy February day in 1945. Robinson was in Chicago to fight one George Costner, a boxer who liked to call himself ”Sugar.”
When the combatants met at the center of the ring to accept the referee`s instructions, Robinson stared at Costner and offered this message:
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”We better touch gloves now,” he said, referring to the customary final-round ritual, ”because this is going to be the only round. Your name ain`t Sugar. Mine is.”
And as sure as Costner was knocked out at 2:49 of the first round, there never was and never will be another boxer as sweet, or as worthy of the nickname Sugar Ray, as Sugar Ray Robinson.
Robinson, whose real name was Walker Smith Jr., died Wednesday in Culver City, Calif., at the age of 68. He lived his last years in a modest two-story home in Los Angeles and had suffered from Alzheimer`s disease since 1983. The L.A. County coroner`s office attributed his death to heart disease.
He was world welterweight champion once and middleweight champion five times, but didn`t get his first title shot until he had fought 75 times, so fearful were the reigning champions of him. Consider, for example, that Sugar Ray Leonard got his first title match after just 25 fights.
It was for Robinson that the term ”uncrowned champion” was invented by sportswriters.
After his first 136 fights, a period of 11 years, he had lost just once, a 10-round decision to Jake LaMotta, whom Robinson defeated the other five times they fought.
He fought 201 times and left the ring in 1965 after a 25-year career with not a mark on him and a record of 174-19-6 (two were ruled no contest) and 109 knockouts. He drove around in a fuchsia Cadillac, and it was for him that the word ”entourage” also entered the boxing lexicon.
Robinson traveled with hairdressers, chefs, chauffeurs and court jesters. Not one to smoke or drink because of his concern for his body, he nevertheless always was the center of attention and the life of the party.
”I`m one of those people who need people,” he once said, adding,
”Money is for spending, for having a good time.”
Robinson also was exceedingly generous, a wildly extravagant tipper and rarely someone who`d come home at night with any money.
”I was born poor,” he once explained. ”I learned early what it was to need help. If God blessed me with the talent to make real big money, then he also entrusted me with the responsibility to care for those without talent.” Which was why he sought as his only legacy the Sugar Ray Youth Foundation, which has provided thousands of Los Angeles inner-city youngsters with constructive activities.
But those who saw Robinson will remember him as perhaps the best boxer ever, which was why people coined another expression for him: ”Best boxer pound-for-pound.”
In his book, ”The 100 Greatest Boxers of All-time,” boxing historian Bert Randolph Sugar, formerly of Ring magazine, rated Robinson No. 1.
He was so slick, columnist Red Smith once wrote, ”He could unbutton an opponent`s shirt from behind while wearing boxing gloves and remove the victim`s pants and bankroll without attracting attention.”
Added the New York Times` Arthur Daley: ”He could outbox the boxers and outpunch the punchers. He had blinding speed of hand, feet and brain. Just watching him work was a sheer delight.”
”He`s the greatest combination of brains, brawn and boxing skill the modern prize ring has ever seen,” wrote New York boxing reporter Dan Parker. So light on his feet was Robinson that after 12 years in the ring he retired-he came back two years later to fight 11 more years and win the middleweight title three times-and toured as a dancer with the Count Basie band.
And so strong was he that he was the first boxer ever to legitimately knock out LaMotta, ”the Raging Bull.” He knocked out middleweight champion Bobo Olson in the second round after coming out of retirement. Rocky Graziano couldn`t last three rounds with him. Even when he was 40, he boxed middleweight titlist Gene Fullmer to a draw.
The son of Walker Smith, a construction worker, Robinson was born in Detroit, and as a 7-year-old would carry the equipment bag of neighborhood hero Joe Louis on his trips to the local Brewster Recreation Center.
His parents were divorced when he was 11, and Robinson, his two sisters and his mother, a seamstress, moved to New York City and lived in a teeming Hell`s Kitchen tenement. To make money, Robinson often would dance outside the Broadway theaters for change. But it also dominated his style.
”Rhythm is everything in boxing,” Robinson once said.
Eventually, he started hanging around the Police Athletic League gyms and was recruited for so-called ”bootleg” fights in which amateurs would fight for money. And it`s where he gained part of his new name. Because he was too young to get a card from the Amateur Athletic Union, he borrowed the card of a friend, Ray Robinson, to compete on the amateur cards.
Robinson lost once in 85 amateur fights and was New York and Intercity Golden Gloves featherweight champion in 1939 and lightweight champion in 1940. And it was at one of those amateur fights, in Watertown, N.Y., in 1939, that a local sportswriter said George Gainford, who would become Robinson`s longtime manager, had ”some sweet fighter there.” Someone else added,
”Sweet as sugar,” and a legendary sobriquet was born.
With his curly, slicked-back hair, Robinson was exceptionally handsome and enjoyed female company. He was married three times and admitted in his autobiography: ”I was taught to obey the 10 Commandments, and I have-except the once about adultery. I`m not proud of having broken it, but I`m neither saint nor sinner. I`m a gladiator.”
That he was. In 1940, he made his professional debut in Madison Square Garden, winning on an easy second-round knockout. In the main event that night, Fritzie Zivic toyed with an aging Henry Armstrong, an idol of Robinson`s, to win the welterweight title. Robinson was so enraged at the way Zivic taunted Armstrong, he vowed revenge and less than two years later beat Zivic twice, knocking him out the second time.
In those first two years of fighting professionally, he would also defeat lightweight champion Sammy Angott in a nontitle match, future welterweight champion Marty Servo and future middleweight champion LaMotta. In fact, Robinson, then a welterweight, frequently fought middleweights because of the lack of competition at his weight.
He lost for the first time after 40 fights to LaMotta in 1943, a 10-round decision, but avenged the loss just three weeks later. And with a tuneup in between. In fact, it was not rare for Robinson to fight several times a month. Finally, in late 1946, after 15 fights that year, after 75 fights since turning pro, including recent defeats of Armstrong, Angott again and LaMotta twice more, Robinson fought for the vacant welterweight title and won a 15-round decision over Tommy Bell.
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By this time, though he didn`t have a title, he was wealthy. He owned a popular Harlem cafe, Sugar Ray`s, and a half-dozen other businesses, all of which would eventually be lost to taxes and free spending. Robinson once estimated that he spent up to $6 million. But he was never bitter.
”I`ve never had a negative thought,” he said. ”Each setback prepared me for a greater triumph. I always believed I was a chosen man.”
In 1947, though, Robinson had his biggest doubts about his career. He was scheduled to defend his title against Jimmy Doyle and had a premonition he`d kill Doyle with a single punch. Robinson didn`t want to fight, and the promoters had to bring a Catholic priest to persuade him. But Robinson knocked Doyle out with a single punch in the eighth round, and Doyle died without ever regaining consciousness.
Robinson was dominating the welterweights, defeating Kid Gavilan twice, Charley Fusari and Bobo Olson, but LaMotta, allegedly tied to the mob that dominated boxing, got the middleweight title shot even though he`d then lost to Robinson four of five times.
Finally, the middleweight title match against LaMotta was set for Chicago Stadium, Feb. 14, 1951. It turned out to be one of the most memorable bouts in boxing history with Robinson winning on a 13th-round knockout, his matador too much for LaMotta`s bull.
Robinson then went back to Europe-reportedly because he refused to comply with a mob request to carry LaMotta in their final fight-on another extensive tour, fighting seven times in six weeks. He lost a 15-round decision and his title to Randy Turpin in London, just his second loss in almost 140 fights.
Two months later, more then 60,000 crowded into the Polo Grounds in New York to see Robinson knock out Turpin to regain his title. He then defended it against Olson and Graziano.
Then in June, 1952, Robinson tried to wrest the light-heavyweight title from Joey Maxim. And it was within his grasp. Robinson was ahead 10-3 in rounds, but had puffed up to light-heavyweight and was felled by the heat of more than 100 degrees that had knocked out referee Ruby Goldstein two rounds earlier. Robinson couldn`t get off his stool for the 14th round and lost.
Although still middleweight champion, he chose to retire and went into show business, reportedly earning $15,000 a week in Las Vegas and $70,000 for a tour with Basie. But after more than two years off, he returned to the ring at 33 and within a year regained his title from Olson.
But he no longer was the unbeatable Sugar Ray and split with his longtime handlers, eventually taking on Drew ”Bundini” Brown, who would later gain fame with Muhammad Ali.
Robinson lost his title to Gene Fullmer in 1957, then knocked out Fullmer to regain the title five months later. He lost it to Carmen Basilio later that year on a split decision, but came back to Chicago in 1958 to regain it with a 15-round decision over Basilio. However, his biggest fights then were with the IRS and a diminishing bankroll.
He went to Boston in 1960 and lost a controversial, hometown decision to Paul Pender. He never again would hold a world title, losing a split decision in the rematch with Pender and then, at the age of 40, a close decision to Fullmer.
Robinson had been married in 1944 to showgirl Edna-Mae Holly, with whom he had a son, Ray Jr. They separated in 1960, and he later married Millie Bruce, who cared for him until his death.
In 1965, when he was 44, he fought 15 times, winning nine. He retired after losing a decision to top contender Joey Archer Nov. 10.
Thereafter, Robinson made bit appearances in movies and TV shows and socialized with Hollywood friends he`d met over the years. He also worked in his youth foundation until the Alzheimer`s decisioned him in his early 60s and soured his last years.
But in the boxing ring, none was ever sweeter.