The eternally celebrated, in reality, for many individuals, the incomparable Sugar Ray Robinson engaged in some savage ring rivalries. Many followers immediately consider Sugar Ray’s a number of wars with Jake LaMotta, maybe Robinson’s fiercest rival. Or possibly followers consider Sugar’s savage battles with Carmen Basilio. Or presumably Robinson’s many encounters with Bobo Olson.
However some argue that the four-ring battles the person born Walker Smith Jr had with the fearsome, rock-chinned Gene Fullmer rank as Robinson’s most testing and memorable fights. Battling it out with the world middleweight title on the road (welterweight being Sugar’s prime and optimum weight), Robinson and Fullmer gave the world some wonderful, back-and-forth stuff.
Combat-one passed off on this present day in 1957. Robinson, already 36 years previous and sporting an astonishing 140-4-2 document, was having fun with his third reign as middleweight king. Fullmer was a tough, powerful warrior a decade youthful, with Gene sporting a 37-3 document. Fullmer had by no means been stopped, whereas Robinson had, this when he had been crushed by the mixed power of over 100-degree warmth and the dimensions and energy of Joey Maxim in a light-heavyweight title problem.
Fullmer, as hungry as a ravenous animal, gave Sugar Ray a hefty beating, with him flooring Robinson within the seventh spherical. Sugar was additionally reduce above the left eye. Robinson one way or the other managed to hold in there to the tip, however he was soundly crushed on factors – the scores being 10-5, 9-6, 8-5 in favor of the brand new middleweight champion.
Robinson had revenge on his thoughts when he left the ring in New York.
The return occurred simply 4 months later, and this time, the boxing world witnessed what is perhaps the knockout of the ages.
Pushing 37, Robinson, preventing Fullmer in Chicago, scored a really particular – it must be studied, to this present day, by any boxing aficionados – one-punch KO over the by no means beforehand unstopped Gene. Going barely backward in spherical 5, Sugar Ray flashed in a blitzing left hook that landed flush on Fullmer’s jaw. Down and completely out – Gene later mentioned he had no reminiscence of the punch or the state it left him in – Fullmer would endlessly be featured within the movie as the person on the receiving finish of probably the most unbelievable KO ever.
It was now 1-1.
Combat three passed off in December of 1960, this time in Boston. By now, Sugar Ray was pushing 40, a critically battle-hardened 144-8-2. Fullmer rebounded from his KO loss to Robinson, beating Sugar’s one-time conqueror Basilio to regain the middleweight crown. Now, coming off a stoppage win over Carmen in a rematch, Fullmer was to be pushed to the restrict by Robinson. The combat was a tricky, at instances arduous to look at, not to mention rating, 15-rounder. Fullmer stored maintain of his title by means of a controversial draw.
Had Sugar Ray been handed the choice win most felt he deserved, we might right this moment be speaking a few SIX-Time middleweight king, not a five-timer, as Ray, after all, was. Actually unbelievable stuff.
Combat-four noticed Fullmer pound out a transparent 15-round resolution win over a Sugar Ray who, by all pure logic, ought to have been lengthy retired at this stage. The ultimate combat on this explicit rivalry passed off in Las Vegas, and Fullmer rounded out this collection the way in which it started – with him profitable by way of UD.
Fullmer and Robinson shared a hoop for simply shy of fifty rounds. Gene in the end received the collection by a rating of 2-1-1. However right this moment, after we look again on the fights Sugar Ray and Fullmer had, we boxing historians notice that we’re the true winners.
