How Sweet It Will Be for Leonard

Sugar Ray Leonard is going to beat Marvelous Marvin Hagler next April, beat him all over his hairless scalp and his hairy jaw.

Leonard is not going to beat him up, exactly. You don’t beat up a guy whose head was made by Brunswick. But he definitely is going to beat him. He is going to sting him, and flick him, and puff his lids, and redden his nostrils, and annoy him, and, most of all, he is going to avoid him, which is the way God intended man to fight M. M. Hagler.

Thomas (Hit Man) Hearns had too much pride for that, and thought the only way to whup Marv Marv was to stand there and hit the man. If Hearns had circled and stayed at arm’s reach and Ali’d the guy that night in April, 1985, he might have won the fight. He could have beaten Hagler on points--which, in case no one has bothered telling Hearns, is not a dishonorable way to win.

Leonard will do it. He will boogie and woogie all over that canvas, doing the smart thing, staying away from Hagler’s punches. See, Hagler has only two things that can hurt you: His left hand and his right hand. If you do not let him mess up your pretty face with either of these things, guess what. You win.

Everybody is so concerned for itty-bitty little Sugar Ray, the poor money-hungry darling, risking life and limb to climb into a ring against Hagler just because of pride and greed.

We advise these bleeding hearts to give it a rest. Let Leonard worry about Leonard. You wouldn’t want anybody telling you how to live your life. Don’t tell Leonard how to live his.

Eleven million green rectangles is reason enough to risk a little bloodshed. You say Sugar Ray’s eyesight is at stake, too. No kidding. Boxers have been getting hit in the sockets for a couple of centuries now. You do not choose boxing for a profession and say: “Gee, I hope nobody hits me in the eyes.” Part of the deal of going into the fight game is that your eyes are going to end up looking like Orphan Annie’s.

Where Leonard is concerned, boxing is not a game. Boxing is his business. A soldier takes certain risks, a fireman takes certain risks and a circus acrobat takes certain risks. Sometimes, you take the risks for others. Sometimes, you take them for yourself. But you do exactly what you choose to do, within the law. Otherwise, you move to Czechoslovakia.

Ray Charles Leonard isn’t hurting anybody but himself. If he ends up with the vision of the man for whom he was named, it will be a pity. But, he is not going to sue boxing. At least, he had better not.

He told the doctors he wanted to fight. The doctors told him he should not. He told the doctors: Don’t tell me if I should, tell me if I may. The doctors told him: It’s your life, mister.

So, the worry grows. But what a surprise Leonard has in store for the boxing world. What a jolt it will be for the know-it-alls at ringside when Sugar Ray’s arm is raised, when Hagler sits there on his stool at the end of a bout that has gone the distance and wonders why he couldn’t swat that doggoned gnat.

Marv Marv will do his best to cut off the ring, to taunt sweet little Sugar into “fighting like a man.” Leonard is too smart for that. He knows if he stands his ground and swaps punches with Brockton Baldy, he is going to wake up around the year 1988. By fighting cleverly, though, Leonard will leave Hagler muttering to himself, along with the Patriots and Red Sox and Massachusetts’ other losers.

(And if you think the Celtics are going to repeat, you’ve got another think coming there, too.)

Leonard’s courage is not being questioned, but his wisdom is. OK, fair enough. There are also, though, those who mock him for going back on his word, for un-retiring when he promised never to fight again. As if he were a stick-up man who had promised a judge that he would be a good citizen from now on.

Leonard stood in a boxing ring in a tuxedo one night and said he realized boxing lovers would love to see him mix it up with Hagler. “That is never going to happen,” Leonard said. Well, Frank Sinatra once gave a farewell concert, sang a line that went “Excuse me while I disappear,” then left the stage in darkness. He came back. It’s OK to come back.

These are two not very gentle gentlemen, Leonard and Hagler, of that there is little argument. True, it used to be that boxers had names like Rocky and Jack and Max, ring names with a certain ring to them, names with a certain brutal distinction. Now, here we are, about to watch a fight between fellows named Marvelous and Sugar. Sounds as though it ought to be a pillow fight.

It will be a war, though, hand-to-hand combat, and bettors will convince themselves that in such a war, Leonard will have no chance. Their everlasting memory will be one of Hearns hitting Hagler with chops that would have slaughtered steers, and Hagler brushing them off as if the Hit Man had just hit him with a rubber chicken.

They will forget that Leonard knocked Hearns goofy, same as Hagler did, just by being patient and taking his time about it. They will forget that Leonard did better against a younger Roberto Duran than Hagler did against an older Roberto Duran. They will forget that bald heads do bleed.

Oh, Sugar. Honey, honey. This is going to be sweet. It will not be like taking candy from a baby. You will have to work hard--and run fast--to earn your $11 million. But come fight night, you are going to beat that man’s cheeks like a tambourine. Show ‘em, Sugar. Show ‘em.