“Four Kings” Dream Fights: Sugar Ray Leonard Vs Miguel Cotto – Fight 3

By Roy “Sharpshooter” Bennett

An ex girlfriend wondering out loud once asked me why boxing fans are so obsessed with mythical match ups between boxers from different eras? To add insult to injury she then made the point that basketball fans didn’t argue about whether the 1950 Minneapolis Lakers could have beaten the 2014 San Antonio Spurs in the NBA playoffs, even though they were both championship winning teams.

My jaw dropped. So I went to get a beer from the refrigerator and gather my thoughts. This was clearly not the woman for me. She was beautiful and she was intelligent but she had to go.

She didn’t understand that mythical match ups were the ultimate indulgence for boxing fans. When normal people had their backs turned, diehard fans of pugilism like to argue the merits of Joe Louis over Muhammad Ali or Harry Greb over Carlos Monzon, among others.

Short of having two boxers at the same weight doing great things in the same era who eventually fight, like Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas Hearns did at welterweight in 1981, mythical match ups were the next best thing. It is our right as boxing fans to break the rules of time, to leap across the ages, and match our favorite fighters against each other in their athletic primes. It is our guilty pleasure. But wait… It’s not as simple as it sounds. You’ve got to qualify why you’re batting for one boxer over another. It’s the unwritten “Golden Rule” of partaking in any mythical match up discussions. You have to be prepared to put up a good argument as to why your guy would smoke the opposition.

You’ve got to know your fighter’s strengths and weaknesses. You’ve got to know what made him special and what chinks he had in his armor. “Sure that fighter could punch but he hated training.”

Know your fighter. Or get the hell out of Dodge. If you’re misinformed or, worse, uninformed you could be the one getting smoked. There are a lot of people out there, ex fighters, trainers, record keepers, writers, and historians, among them, inhabiting the Internet boxing forums and group pages who are hardcore boxing heads who the term “Expert” truly applies to, and in the game of show and tell, they will rip you to shreds if you’re unable to present a coherent argument.

But I get it. They see it as their duty to protect the history of the sport from what I term as the, “Reality TV crowd.” Those misguided individuals who want to reduce everything to the lowest common denominator. They will try to argue that Mike Tyson is the greatest heavyweight to ever walk the face of the earth. But yet none of them can qualify why they believe that to be the case without sounding foolish, because the evidence to support such an outlandish claim is simply not to be found in Tyson’s body of professional work. But as objective as we try to be, when it really boils down to it the fight game pulls at every human emotion. Joy, pride, disappointment, anger, and everything in-between.

It sometimes divides fans along national or ethnic lines. It lifts us up to dizzying heights and it drags us down into depressing lows. But boxing fans are like jilted lovers who keep coming back for that intense make up sex. Yeah, I said it. For us it’s the hope we’ll see that next Fight of the Year” or the “Super Fight” that surpasses all expectations. We’re hooked on it and can’t stay away.

We’re tied to the fighters we grew up watching. The music we listened to, the clothes we wore. The boxers we followed. All conjure up certain feelings. A bit like the smell of freshly baked bread might invoke a memory of a childhood moment at the family dining table. So, join me as I continue the mythical match up tradition by pitting the “Four Kings,” Marvin Hagler, Thomas Hearns, Sugar Ray Leonard, and Roberto Duran against four of today’s best.

All fights are scheduled for the championship distance of 15 rounds. You read that right. And we’re going with same day weigh-ins too. None of this putting on twenty pounds over night nonsense. If any of these rules upset you, you’re watching the wrong sport. Go watch Ping Pong instead. There’s no political correctness here. This is the hardest game there is. Heavyweight Champion Joe Frazier said it best, “Boxing is the only game where you can get your brain shook, your money took, and your name in the undertaker’s book.”

I’ve seen many heated arguments on the boards and forums over the years between fans of different fighters and when it comes to mythical match ups things sometimes tend toward the ultra serious with neither side willing to budge in the discussion. So, in the spirit of injecting a little light heartedness into the proceedings I’m going to use a few quotes from the Rocky movies to describe a certain energy around each fight. So get your hands up and your mouthpiece in. Here we go. “Ding Ding”.

“You’d better get that look off your face before I knock it off.” — Clubber Lang

Sugar Ray Leonard had that megawatt smile and was America’s media darling. Miguel Cotto is stone faced and it’s hard for the media to get a good quote out of him. Leonard loved the media attention. Cotto would prefer to be left alone to get on with his business. They are polar opposites in almost every way except one. They both love to fight. Leonard may have looked like a choirboy but if he hurt you he was a vicious finisher. When he fought Wilfred Benitez, Roberto Duran, Ayub Kalule, and Thomas Hearns, they had a combined record of 177 wins against only 1 loss. Leonard beat them all inside the scheduled distance.

Leonard, 36-3-1, 25 KO’s, was a beautifully balanced boxer. Relaxed muscles gave a suppleness to his movements and because of this he was incredibly quick. Leonard would sway at the waist, this way and that way with that half smile on his face while he was working out how to get you. And he already knew he was going to get you. It was just a matter of time. Ray was imbued with a rare confidence, some would say arrogance. But it was more than that. It was the look of man who enjoyed and believed in his God given abilities and he wasn’t afraid to show it.

Cotto, 40-4, 33 KO’s, likes to get into medium range and go for broke with big hooks to the body and head. He has good power and serviceable skills when he elects to use them but he’s too slow of hand and foot to cause a slick speedster like Leonard any real problems. Cotto leans forward with his head in the middle between his gloves and it would prove disastrous for him in this fight. And the way he winds up that big left hook he’d be hitting nothing but thin air with it. Sugar Ray Leonard is a much better puncher than Floyd Mayweather, JR. Cotto could end up going the way of England’s Dave “Boy” Green in this fight. I see Leonard ripping off deadly accurate three and four punch combinations after walking Cotto onto heavy single shots that he doesn’t see coming. Cotto’s attempts to work Leonard’s body against the ropes are met with swift head snapping uppercuts and left hooks that buckle Cotto’s knees and make him back up. A single left hook to the jaw puts Cotto down for the count in mid ring to end matters decisively at some point before the 8th round. During the post fight interview Leonard stands in mid ring combing his hair and announces his retirement once again…

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