Is Sugar Ray Robinson overrated?

[RJJ-94-02=GOAT]

He’s overrated by some and under-appreciated by others.

In general I would say no, he is not overrated. People who have actually studied Robinson and not just Boxrec’d and YouTubed him know how great he was.

[JakeTheBoxer]

I don`t know, he had many fights, around 200+, but many of them were against occasional boxers. It is hard to say because there is very little total footage of his fights.

It is not fair comparing modern guys to old boys, because we know everything about modern guys. People have seen by their eyes mayweather -pacquiao and still claim Floyd lost. But the same people believe SRR is the best ever, because some books say so?

[QueensburyRules]

Once you reach the pinnacle of a sport and reach a legendary status it becomes hard to be surpassed. For example, it is exoterically percieved to the general public that Michael Jordan will forever be the greatest basketball player of all time; that is hard to argue against no matter who is on top of the game today. Guys like Kobe Bryant and Lebron James will forever be in his shadow. Whether it is true or not, people will always sway to Jordan no matter the circumstance, but that is another topic entirely.

This brings me to Muhammad Ali, the general consensus of any casual fan will always say he is the greatest boxer of all time.

Furthermore, to most "hardcore" boxing fans, many will say Sugar Ray Robinson holds that title. Has it become a norm to throw Robinson's name out there because every other "hardcore" boxing fans say so? Does it seem like no one wants to dispute that statement out of fear of being ridiculed in the boxing community and to be dissmissed with the statement "You don't know SHlT about boxing"? I'm not undermining Sugar's natural raw ability and inimitable talent & impressive amateur career, but it could it be the reason why he flourished so well was because of the era he was in. I can't really speak about that era he fought because I was not alive in that time, but it seems to me he fought in era where fighters weren't so "sweet". I've seen quite a few of his professional bouts and many highlights of his and although he had immeasurable power in both hands and had a wide variety of punches in his arsenal, I just don't see how he is the greatest of all time. His boxing IQ was good, but it didn't seem elite. Don't get me wrong, I think he would be a threat in any era, but I personally feel Marvin Hagler & Hopkins would have beaten him. Can someone give me logical and legit reasons as why he is labled "Greatest of All Time" to many hardcore boxing fans and convince me as to why he has earn that title. Your input is highly appreciated. Thank you.

- -That U think a coddled Nancy like Jordon is the greatest pretty much defines the vacuous mentality of U era.

There is a debate on the greatest fighter, but U wouldn't qualify for it.

[Butt stuff]

Yeah I actually think Duran is more skilled than Robinson. When I look back at tape, there are fighters who just blow me away with their skill. Duran is one, Napoles is another, as well as fighters like Archie Moore, George Benton, etc. Robinson isn't one of those fighters though. To me Robinson was obviously skilled and smart, but he was more of an athletic freak and physical specimen.

He was a 5'11 welterweight, iron chin, atg power, great speed and very light feet. He was the perfect fighter from a physical standpoint. When I watch him, I don't marvel at his technique similar to Muhammad Ali. I am in awe of his God given gifts.

Definitely agree with being blown away by Duran, he does incredible things – like standing right up against a fighter, making them miss multiple times and then KOing them.

But Ali actually based a lot of his style on Robinson, he was a huge fan of the guy.

[BoloShot]

He's not overrated with a résumé of prime opponents like his. Ali I think is incredibly overrated due to many of his great wins coming under either dubious circumstances or being against less than prime opponents. Both Norton wins were robberies for me, he struggled very greatly with a very one note Frazier and never corrected his mistakes. Liston, Patterson and Moore were all way past their primes. The rest were all B level fighters max. Foreman even was beaten by an illegal strategy that relied on another illegal act in slackening of ropes.

His best win came against Cleveland Williams after he was shot in the gut and had three feet of intestine removed FFS, hardly a fully able man to be fighting. The legend also goes that he totally lost his prime between the ages of 25 and 28, which is ridiculous and only his fault, best my ass. No wonder he looked so good against the likes of William, Patterson and Liston, a man he shouldn't have been fighting then as he cheated to get past his eliminator against Cooper. He's a good example of someone hyped by casuals and the media.

Sugar Ray beat 10 Hall Of Famers in their primes mostly and with little controversy most of the time. If that's hype, then I don't know who's any good. That'd mean Greb is a nobody too and I doubt that anyone could say that and be sane.

[ShoulderRoll]

- -That U think a coddled Nancy like Jordon is the greatest pretty much defines the vacuous mentality of U era.

Coddled? You obviously never heard of the Jordan Rules nor saw how the Detroit Pistons were allowed to physically beat up on him for years.

If you don't know what you're talking about then you should probably just keep your mouth shut.

[hugh grant]

He probably is overated although still a candidate for goat, just in reality it's not foregone conclusion. Back then most boxers have 100s of fights and with amazing amount of wins. So I'm assuming every fought there fair share of tomato cans.
It's hard to say how good the opponents were back then as you'd have to look at the opponents of srr wins and with that knowledge in sure you could pick apart srr resume. But most probably couldn't be that bothered to. That's a historians job and they often are bias and don't earn their reputation and money.

If you were a boxing fan back then you can gauge srr. It's more difficult if you grow up today as it's hard enough to know how good today's boxers are. Boxers who are praised without great wins just eye test

[GhostofDempsey]

Every fighter will have a few holes in their resume. Robinson was criticized for never fighting the black murderer's row of fighters who were often avoided such as Charley Burley, Holman Williams, Lloyd Marshall, Jack Chase, etc. They were the Langford, Jeannette, McVea of their time who couldn't get title shots against Jack Johnson. Sure there are a lot of no-hopers on his resume, which were stay busy fights. We can say the same of most fighters who had well over a 100 fights...Pep, Moore, Armstrong, etc. It was a different era.

Yet, you have to consider Robinson fought 199 fights, was only stopped inside the distance once, and that was from heat exhaustion while stepping up in weight. The man was never knocked out! Well past his prime he was still beating top MWs like Fullmer and Basilio. Going the distance with Giardello after the age of 40, and several other top MWs of the early 60s.

Other candidates to consider as great P4P fighters who are often overlooked would be Ike Williams, Sammy Angott, Beau Jack, Luis Rodriquez, Tony Canzoneri, among others.

[therealpugilist]

This is a ridiculous argument though, why haven't you included Marciano if those are your requirements for a 'best ever' basis. Furthermore, all of those guys did lose apart from Floyd and Ward (whose career is not over yet.) I assume that is because many of those fighters didn't lose until they were past their prime correct?

So consider this, 10 of Ray Robinsons losses came after he was 40 years old, 16 of them after his 3 year retirement after the Maxim fight, 18 of them after his 30th Birthday. So, before his 30th birthday Ray Robinson was 128-1. There is no possible way to compare that to today where fighters have 2-3 months a year to prepare for a single fight, and had 28 fights against Hall of Fame fighters.

Now I know the math doesn't exactly work this way but consider if Hopkins had fought maybe 100 times with the same success rate as he has now. He is 55-7, he would be 110-14, and so on and so forth.

Whether Ray Robinson is the best ever is a decent argument, Willie Pep deserves to be there as do many of the names you mentioned but there isn't even an argument that he is close to the top. It really isn't, bear in mind his most famous fights are the ones he had in his late 30's for the middleweight title. In his welterweight days he was imperious, running through opposition. And surely, you should maybe watch a full fight before even trying to pass judgement.

thread/

[NachoMan]

Once you reach the pinnacle of a sport and reach a legendary status it becomes hard to be surpassed. For example, it is exoterically percieved to the general public that Michael Jordan will forever be the greatest basketball player of all time; that is hard to argue against no matter who is on top of the game today. Guys like Kobe Bryant and Lebron James will forever be in his shadow. Whether it is true or not, people will always sway to Jordan no matter the circumstance, but that is another topic entirely.

This brings me to Muhammad Ali, the general consensus of any casual fan will always say he is the greatest boxer of all time.

Furthermore, to most "hardcore" boxing fans, many will say Sugar Ray Robinson holds that title. Has it become a norm to throw Robinson's name out there because every other "hardcore" boxing fans say so? Does it seem like no one wants to dispute that statement out of fear of being ridiculed in the boxing community and to be dissmissed with the statement "You don't know SHlT about boxing"? I'm not undermining Sugar's natural raw ability and inimitable talent & impressive amateur career, but it could it be the reason why he flourished so well was because of the era he was in. I can't really speak about that era he fought because I was not alive in that time, but it seems to me he fought in era where fighters weren't so "sweet". I've seen quite a few of his professional bouts and many highlights of his and although he had immeasurable power in both hands and had a wide variety of punches in his arsenal, I just don't see how he is the greatest of all time. His boxing IQ was good, but it didn't seem elite. Don't get me wrong, I think he would be a threat in any era, but I personally feel Marvin Hagler & Hopkins would have beaten him. Can someone give me logical and legit reasons as why he is labled "Greatest of All Time" to many hardcore boxing fans and convince me as to why he has earn that title. Your input is highly appreciated. Thank you.

As always with these types of questions, we must start with agreed-upon criteria. Otherwise you'll have a 600 page thread with people arguing back and forth with completely different notions about how to evaluate this sort of thing. To me, the major criteria are competition faced and competition beaten. Titles, style, social impact, etc, etc, are all ancillary things that really have relatively little weight, but are things that many fans prioritize for whatever reason.