Pound for Pound : A Biography of Sugar Ray Robinson

From Publishers Weekly
In hands as skilled at the keyboard as Sugar Ray Robinson's were in the ring, this athlete would've been a great biography subject. His charisma and winning technique made him the prince of Harlem in the WWII era (though he's primarily known to modern audiences as Jake LaMotta's opponent in Raging Bull). His friendship with Joe Louis helped eradicate color barriers. His fighting skills may have been equaled since then, but they've never been surpassed—he was so powerful he killed a man in the ring. And his excesses of libido, temper, spousal abuse and bling-bling were, Boyd points out, tragic precursors of the behavior of many modern black athletes. Regrettably, the book is minimally competent and, at worst, painful. The journalist rarely devotes more than a few sentences to any of Robinson's matches, some of which, like the LaMotta battles, are the most talked about in boxing history. Instead, readers get puns ("The nation may have been experiencing a rationing of sugar, but the other Sugar was on a rampage") and ostentatious metaphors ("There were many fights when Sugar was a virtuoso pianist with gloves on, a soloist in a pugilist recital, delivering a rapid arpeggio of stiff left jabs"). Robinson is a worthy subject awaiting a more worthy treatment. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
In the nebulous category of history's best "pound for pound" boxer, there's no stronger candidate than Sugar Ray Robinson. Lamotta, Graziano, Fullmer--Robinson pummeled them all, but his career has been neglected in print. In this first serious biography of the original Sugar, Boyd (with Robinson's son, Ray II) charts Robinson's ascension to world champion and Harlem business tycoon. But, like so many boxers, Robinson couldn't stay on top: as he aged, his solid marriage to Ray II's mother fell apart, his businesses failed, and his legendary ring speed abandoned him. Boyd nicely ties Robinson's story to the larger history of Harlem: when Robinson was at his peak in the 1940s, so, too, was Harlem, and they both slid precipitously into poverty and despair. But Boyd never delves very deeply into Robinson or his times. Rather than describing fights, for instance, Boyd too often merely writes who won. Fans will wish for more about Sugar Ray's elegance and speed in the ring (which, Boyd points out, Ali would one day emulate), but this is a serviceable introduction to a great fighter. John Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Kirkus Reviews
"Admiring biography that neither glosses over nor dwells on [Ray’s] not-always-great behavior outside the ring."

Ebony
"A rich history of the athlete, the man, teeh sport and a fascinating time in African American history."

Essence
"An informative account of the life of Hollywood-handsome middleweight champion Sugar Ray Robison."


"A nuanced, sensitive, critical, and definitive biography of arguably the greatest boxer of all time."

Book Description

Hailed by Muhammad Ali as "the king, the master, my idol," Sugar Ray Robinson was the greatest boxer America had seen since Joe Louis and is considered by many today to be, pound for pound, the best boxer the sport has ever known. A world welterweight and five-time middleweight champion, he had a career that spanned three decades. With his graceful yet powerful style and Hollywood looks -- which he would use to his advantage upon his final retirement from boxing -- he embodied the very essence of the "sweet science." Before he finally hung up his boxing gloves in 1965, at the age of forty-four, Sugar Ray Robinson won 125 consecutive fights, including victories over Henry Armstrong, Kid Gavilan, Carmen Basilio, Jake LaMotta, Rocky Graziano, Gene Fullmer, and Randy Turpin. His successes were not his alone, however. They belonged to his family as well, though those relationships would be marked by neglect and abuse.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"Hailed by Muhammad Ali as "the king, the master, my idol," Sugar Ray Robinson was the greatest boxer America had seen since Joe Louis and is considered by many today to be, pound for pound, the best boxer the sport has ever known. A world welterweight and five-time middleweight champion, he had a career that spanned three decades. Before he finally hung up his boxing gloves in 1965, at the age of forty-four, Sugar Ray Robinson won 125 consecutive fights, including victories over Henry Armstrong, Kid Gavilan, Carmen Basilio, Jake LaMotta, Rocky Graziano, Gene Fullmer, and Randy Turpin." At a time still characterized by discrimination, his victories, like those of Jackie Robinson, represented victories for all black America. And they were all the more symbolic because of the place he chose to call home - Harlem. Co-written with Robinson's son, Ray Robinson II, and thoroughly researched by Amsterdam News reporter Herb Boyd, Pound for Pound is not only a definitive portrait of an emotionally complex man and his family, it is also a portrait of Harlem at the apex of its creativity, a time when Miles Davis was playing at Minton's, Langston Hughes was writing his divine poetry, and a boy from Georgia originally named Walker Smith Jr. would take on the moniker "Sugar."

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

Robinson, both a welterweight and a five-time world middleweight champion, bested Henry Armstrong, Jake LaMotta, Rocky Graziano, and other great fighters. Journalist Boyd (coauthor, Brotherman) and Ray Jr. draw on the manuscript of the boxer's wife to tell of the boxing great's meteoric rise, long reign, and sad fall, along the way painting a portrait of the lively Harlem in which Robinson was such a star attraction. Sugar Ray's two fights with Carmen Basilio were cited in Don Dumphy at Ringside as among the greatest fights the veteran broadcaster had seen. Robinson's philandering extravagance and illnesses clouded his later life. This candid portrait should be welcome on public library sports shelves, along with Robinson's own Sugar Ray (written with Dave Anderson).-Morey Berger, St. Joseph's Hosp. Lib., Tucson, AZ Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Admiring biography of the great fighter that neither glosses over nor dwells on his not-always-great behavior outside the ring. Boyd (editor, The Harlem Reader, 2003, etc.; African-American Sudies/College of New Rochelle) gets help from Sugar Ray Robinson's son in portraying a complex man with serious problems-problems outweighed only by the sheer mass of his boxing achievements: 85 amateur wins and no losses; 175 professional wins to only 19 defeats, 6 draws, 1 no-decision, 1 no-contest; a career that lasted from 1940 to 1965. The head-shaking wow of these statistics propels the story forward, since Boyd makes no pretense to being anything more than a journeyman boxing writer. Still, he's an intelligent student of the sweet science and makes all the right noises about Robinson's artistry, his "fundamental coordinates of speed and power," his left hook and right cross. Where Boyd excels, however, is in squaring Robinson's life (1921-89) to his milieu, which for many years was Harlem. During the neighborhood's most vibrant years of music, literature, entrepreneurialism, and political activism, Robinson moved through Harlem like a force of nature, starting businesses, serving as an example of success on a large scale, living high and bright. He was not a druggie or a boozer, but he was an insatiable womanizer; he was a miserable father, but he gave to charities; he was never bought by the mob, but he required a huge entourage; he beat his opponents mercilessly, and his women as well. (Their son says his abuse caused Robinson's wife to have five miscarriages.) He bombed in business, failed to support his family, ingloriously tanked in the ring, was a one-stop garnishing center for the IRS.He soared and crashed, Boyd notes, much like his Harlem. Not much different from the antics that got Mike Tyson pilloried, though Robinson never chewed off an opponent's ear. Still, icons get special treatment, Boyd makes clear, and geniuses are forgiven their many trespasses. (8-page b&w photo insert, not seen)Agent: Marie Brown/Marie Brown & Associates

ACCREDITATION