Edna Mae had just waved good-bye to her son and watched him ride off with his father en route to the airport when she got a phone call from one of Sugar’s former associates. He was irate and blabbering all kinds of nonsense about Sugar and what he was going to do to him if he didn’t get the money he was owed. “He was very distraught,” she stated. “He said he had gone to Sugar’s office and asked for some of his money. He told Sugar that his bills were piling up, yet whenever Sugar traveled, he would inevitably have an entourage. He knew that was costing Sugar big money, but that he also needed money, and immediately.” He told her that Sugar spoke to him like he was nothing but a piece of trash. The angry associate felt he had been used and abused by Sugar.
“I went back later that night and I saw him go into his office alone,” Edna Mae said the man told her. “I followed him into the office and locked the door. I forced him at gunpoint to open the safe, but there was no money in it. I told him that if anyone else had treated me like he did and spoken to me like he did that day, I’d have killed them.” He said that he kept the gun pressed against Sugar’s head, while he begged for his life. Sugar’s life was spared, but as soon as he left the office, Sugar called the police.
The man told Edna Mae that he knew Sugar was going to the airport to take a flight to Hawaii, “but the plane will never get off the ground.” After he hung up the phone, she called the airport to see if Sugar and Ray had boarded and if the plane was in flight. They were still waiting to board when she reached her ex-husband. Sugar told her that the flight had been delayed because of a report that there might be a bomb on the plane. She was a nervous wreck until the plane finally landed safely in Hawaii.
Sugar rarely mentions any of his sparring mates in his autobiography, but much of his sharpness in a fight can be attributed to a stable of fighters who often took a beating to get him ready. “Two of them stand out in my mind,” said boxing aficionado Clint Edwards of the sparring partners who helped Sugar sharpen his skills and plot his moves. “Dino Woodard and Danny “Bang Bang” Womber. They could throw plenty of leather. Bang Bang eventually ended up working in Sugar’s barbershop, the Golden Glover. He was the process man who ‘gassed’ the hair of all the pimps and players who came through. Duke Ellington, B. B. King, a number of big-name entertainers with a ‘do’ patronized Sugar’s shop. And there was Gene Burton, who was not a sparring partner but Sugar’s stablemate. They banged each other around in several exhibition bouts. Naw, he wasn’t like the other ‘opponents’ who padded Sugar’s resume.”1
Author Joyce Carol Oates views “opponents” thusly: “An ‘opponent’ is known in the boxing trade as a man who loses, and is dependable,” she explained. “Matched with a younger, promising boxer with financial backing he will give a decent showing…He may have dreams of winning a title but his value to the trade is that he helps build up…another boxer’s record. His career is a foregone conclusion: He has none.” In short, she notes, “he is a human punching bag.”2 The flip side of an opponent was a “policeman.” Jake LaMotta was a policeman, a concept he explains in great detail: “In boxing a ‘policeman’ is a top fighter who, for one reason or another, can’t get a crack at the title. So the only fights he can get to make any money are with the real tough kids on the way up—the ones the champ himself would just as soon duck. Archie Moore was a policeman for years, and Rocky (Graziano) used to like to use the tag with me because I was knocking off guys he would like to give a miss to.”3
Given this definition, Sugar was, from 1940 to 1946, a patient policeman waiting to be called.
Upon their return from Hawaii in June, Sugar and Millie moved into one of the bedrooms at his mother’s house. Since they planned to be on the road a lot, the living arrangements were only part-time, and would eliminate the cost of renting an apartment. And this made a lot of sense for a fighter who was living part of the time in California and the rest in New York City.
In addition, their troubled financial state had been further damaged a month before, when the Justice Department filed suit asking Sugar to return a tax refund of $123,935.65 that he had received on May 13, 1963. The suit was presented in the nick of time, because in two days the statute of limitations would have expired. Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach said the case involved the amount of taxes Sugar owed on earnings from a middleweight title fight with Carmen Basilio on September 23, 1957. In April, the United States Tax Court had backed Sugar by ruling that he did not owe as much as the government claimed. However, it did not stipulate how much he did owe. The decision brought to a close a situation that began when Sugar thought he had made a deal with the IRS on past taxes. Sugar, according to the government, which had rejected his installment payment plan, should have reported the full income from the fight in 1957, rather than the $139,600 he disclosed as 1957 earnings.4 Once more Sugar was in desperate need of cash, which meant more blows in the ring with opponents who could not guarantee substantial gate receipts.
On June 24, 1965, Sugar was in Richmond, where he won a ten-round decision over Young Joe Walcott (no relation to Jersey Joe Walcott, whose real name was Arnold Cream). Young Walcott would take two more plasterings from Sugar, in Richmond on July 27 and in Philadelphia on September 23. Walcott was Sugar’s opponent in three of his last nine fights, and they were often tune-ups for something bigger down the road, such as Sugar’s bout with Joey Archer, a stick-and-jab boxer, in Pittsburgh, the two finally contracting for the winter. In the meantime, Sugar was on his way back to Honolulu by August.
He had just returned from Hawaii, after experiencing another loss to Harrington, when the Watts riots erupted, once again stemming from a clash between the black community and white police officers. It took 13,000 National Guardsmen to halt the five-day outburst, which left 34 dead, some 900 injured, and more than 3,000 arrested and which caused property damage of $225 million. According to Edna Mae, Ray II, who had been with his father and stepmother since their trip to Honolulu, “had already called me and asked to come home because his father had struck him twice. Sugar had also struck several other people, including members of his staff and family. His striking his son really had me puzzled, because at home he could not even stay in the room with us if I ever attempted to discipline the child.” Now, she said, things had obviously changed, and so had Sugar.
One very demonstrable change in Sugar was his immersion in the political arena. Jazz trumpeter Freddie Hubbard said that Sugar campaigned for New York City mayoral candidate John Lindsay in the summer of 1965, not too long after Lindsay threw his hat in the ring in May. “When Lindsay came to Brooklyn to campaign for mayor, he brought Sugar Ray Robinson and [they] went to the biggest Baptist Church in Brooklyn.” This was probably Concord Baptist Church, then pastored by the venerable Reverend Dr. Gardner C. Taylor.5
Sugar’s relationship with Lindsay eventually soured, when the ex-champ was unable to get an audience with the mayor during his first few months in office. The falling-out, according to Woody Klein, Lindsay’s press secretary during his first administration, in his memoir Lindsay’s Promise: The Dream That Failed, can be blamed primarily on the mayor’s over-scheduling. Klein recalled that Sugar had campaigned for Lindsay throughout the summer and made an appointment to see the mayor one afternoon in February. “Lindsay was already two hours behind in his schedule by the time Robinson’s turn came,” he said. “A secretary asked him to wait even longer. Robinson became insulted and stormed out of City Hall. This was not an unusual occurrence. Others were angry at the Mayor for failing to keep appointments on time. But Ray Robinson was a ‘name’ and the press knew about his visit that day. The result: a story in the morning Herald Tribune headlined: SUGAR RAY QUITS LINDSAY TEAM. It pointed out that Robinson, who had also accompanied the Mayor on his daily morning walks to City Hall from midtown during the transit strike, had turned down an offer from the Mayor to become a member of the city’s new Sports Committee, consisting of fifteen famous athletes. ‘I don’t want any job,’ he was quoted as saying. ‘I’m not a politician. The man [Lindsay] seems to have changed since he got elected. I hope I don’t regret that I campaigned for him.’” Sugar proved somewhat prophetic, because Lindsay would in 1969 switch his allegiance from the Republican Party, after he failed to win its primary in a reelection bid, to the Liberal Party.
Sugar had two fights in October, and he won them both. He had to win these tune-up matches in preparation for a more difficult challenge from Joey Archer, the fancy-dancer, slick boxer from thw Bronx with hardly any dynamite in his punch. At forty-four, Sugar was in the best condition he had been in years, perhaps feeling that his advanced age required additional sparring sessions and roadwork. He was serious about this fight, and serious about another shot at the middleweight title. A title bout would bring in more money, much more than the $790 he had earned beating Peter Schmidt in Johnston, Pennsylvania, on October 1, and far more than the $500 that was his take after stopping Rudolf Bent in Steubenville, Ohio, in the third round on October 20.
The bout with Archer was set for November 10, and Sugar was as enthusiastic about the encounter as he was when he’d first turned pro 201 fights before. “Archer was supposed to have a tough chin,” Sugar mused. “He had only been down once in his career. But nobody had a tougher chin than Fullmer, and I took him out with my left hook.” One factor that Sugar failed to consider, however, was age. At twenty-seven, Archer was almost eighteen years Sugar’s junior, and while he may not have possessed a knockout punch, neither had he ever been knocked out. Sugar would have to conjure up some of the magic of old to overcome the odds.
It was a good thing the fight was in Pittsburgh, and not in New York City. The night before the fight, Manhattan, like other cities in the Northeast corridor, was pitch black. The blackout was the result of power lines from Niagara Falls to New York City operating near their maximum capacity. At about five-fifteen a transmission line relay failed. Now there was insufficient line capacity for New York City. The power grid wasn’t prepared to handle this overload.
Nor was Sugar ready for Archer’s maximum capacity.
Two rounds into the fight with the younger Archer, Sugar was up on his toes and bouncing with confidence, jolting him with crisp and effective combinations. However, when Sugar landed what he thought was his best punch, Archer blinked a bit but shook it off. That was not a good sign. In the fourth round, Sugar feinted with his left, but his legs got tangled, and Archer unleashed a solid right hand that plunked Sugar on the top of the head. Since Sugar was already off balance from a series of feints and tangled feet, the punch put him flat on his behind. Although the punch was not that effective, Sugar decided to take a nine count and catch his breath. But Sugar was much more fatigued than he thought, and found it difficult to get back his previous sharpness. “At the final bell, I just wanted to get out of the ring. Disappear. Vanish.” As the decision went to Archer, Sugar searched the audience for Millie, who had been screaming words of support throughout the fight. “That’s all right, honey,” she yelled now at Sugar. “You didn’t get hurt.”
Sugar wasn’t in pain physically, but emotionally he was a wreck, and embarrassed as never before. Jazz great Miles Davis was equally embarrassed by Sugar’s futility. Pete Hamill, the columnist-novelist, was sitting next to Davis that night. “I remember Miles standing up, and there were tears welling his face to have seen this because I think he believed Robinson was going to get knocked out.” After the fight, Hamill recalls, Davis went to the dressing room, leaned over Robinson, lying on a rubdown table, and said, “Ray, you’re packing it in.” Robinson nodded his head and said, “You’re right.”6
Sugar felt a little better later on when Archer came over to congratulate him on a splendid fight and to say how much he admired him. One fan told Sugar he was just like the Sugar Ray Robinson of old, but to Sugar he was just old Sugar Ray Robinson. Would there be a return match? Sugar’s manager, Gainford, shook his head in disgust, insisting the fight should have gone to his man. He denounced the officials and promised that if there were another bout with Archer, it wouldn’t be in Pittsburgh.
That evening in his hotel room, Sugar decided it was time to have a heart-to-heart talk with Millie about his career. “I’m not going to have any more fights,” he promised. “No more comebacks.” Millie was elated, and told him that was her wish too. His career would end with a defeat, but he had compiled an enviable record, one that any fighter would be proud of, that few could equal, and no one could take that away from him.
From the Archer bout, Sugar had enough money to rent an apartment on Riverside Drive. He didn’t want to risk having his relationship spoiled because of his mother, who he believed had interfered in his relationship with Edna Mae.
Not too long after the fight he got a call from John Condon, chief of publicity at Madison Square Garden, and a man Sugar greatly respected. He wanted Sugar to come down to his office; there was something special he wanted to discuss with him. What Condon proposed was a special tribute to Sugar, to be scheduled December 10, exactly a month after his last fight. This would be an opportunity for his fans to see him one more time, in a ceremony honoring his illustrious career. Condon told him that the Garden would be featuring a welterweight title fight between Emile Griffith and Manuel Gonzalez. A half hour before the fight the arena would be darkened, Condon explained; then the four guys he defeated for the middleweight crown would be summoned to the ring and introduced to the crowd before proceeding to neutral corners of the ring.
There was only one proviso: Sugar had to promise that there would be no more fights, no comebacks, lest it look like the whole idea was a setup to bilk folks out of money. Sugar had a proviso as well: If RKO-Television was going to televise the event, then he would have to be paid. The television producer was also at the meeting, and was momentarily taken aback. “But we thought you would consider it good for boxing if it was on,” he pleaded with Sugar. “I want it good for Sugar Ray, too,” the boxer responded. Though in the twilight of his long career, Sugar was still finding ways to be a pacesetter. It was not the first time he had demanded extra compensation for television rights, but this time others were paying attention, and in a few years it would be a standard clause in a fighter’s contract.
To avoid paying Sugar, his ceremony was scheduled a half hour before the ten o’clock fight and would be over by the time the televised championship bout began. (However, the entire ceremony was filmed, and is included in a documentary by Bill Cayton on Sugar, titled Pound for Pound.) When Sugar was introduced to the crowd, he half strolled, half trotted to the ring apron, bounded up the steps, bent through the ropes, and danced around the ring in a knee-length white terry cloth robe. His hair was glistening under the Garden lights. The thunderous applause was a good sign that those fans who were rankled by Sugar’s dismal recent performances were willing to forgive, and to remember instead the thrills he had provided in the ring over the last score of years. “They cheered him wildly, frantically, affectionately, with unconcealed emotion and enthusiasm,” wrote New York Times sports reporter Joe Nichols. Ring announcer Johnny Addie then introduced Sugar’s former opponents: Bobo Olson, Gene Fullmer, Carmen Basilio, and Randy Turpin. Each of them entered the ring attired in boxing gear and robes, embraced Sugar, and departed to a corner. The embrace from Turpin was especially warm and genuine. Even Basilio, who had very little affection for Sugar and often referred to him as an “arrogant son of a bitch,” appeared gracious and sincere. “LaMotta was there too,” Sugar reminisced, “but the State Athletic Commission wouldn’t permit him to be introduced in the ring because he had confessed to fixing his fight with Billy Fox.”
LaMotta remembered the event this way: “The Garden promoters brought in, at their expense, all the former middleweight champions that Robinson had fought…they even brought Randy Turpin in from England. Who was the only former champ they excluded? Jake LaMotta, that’s who!…I was the only former champ who could have walked to the Garden! I lived ten blocks away. I still ask myself, what the hell did I do so wrong that deserved such treatment?”
Former mayor Vincent Impellitteri was given the honor of presenting Sugar with a huge trophy that was inscribed “The World’s Greatest Fighter.”
Sugar was never much for words, particularly in such a large setting as this. But after a moment of stammering he said what was in his heart: “This is the first time I’ve had an experience such as this. I don’t know whether to be happy or sad, but it fills me full. I’m not a crybaby, but it just gets to me. I know it’s not good-bye, but it is farewell.” Then came one of his favorite French phrases, which he had learned during his European tours: “Tout à l’heure” (I’ll see you later). The Garden, with more than twelve thousand in attendance, erupted with deafening applause, more deafening even than when he had beaten the four men now gracing the corners during seven title fights—four men who now triumphantly hoisted him on their shoulders.
As Sugar enjoyed the moment, singer/actor Gordon MacRae began singing, “Should auld acquaintance be forgot…,” and Sugar recognized this as his cue to take his final bows and to exit the ring, lugging a giant-size trophy to an apartment that he claimed didn’t have a decent table to hold it. Before he left the ring, however, there was one last glance around the arena, where nearly all the spectators were on their feet, whistling and cheering, their hands banging together.
Two hours later, at a sit-down dinner at Mamma Leone’s, Sugar was toasted again. Joining the fighters and dignitaries from the ceremony were Mayor John Lindsay, whom Sugar had helped to win the election, and Muhammad Ali, whom Sugar insisted on calling Cassius Clay. Clearly, Sugar had set aside his past grudges against the two men. For more than a couple of hours the fighters swapped memories about past fights, each topping the other with anecdotes and tall tales. But soon the party was over. And repeatedly Sugar and Millie heard fans and friends cry out, “You were the best, Sugar Ray. Pound for pound, you were the best.”