Sugar Ray Leonard believes there is a clear choice for which of his fellow ‘Four Kings’ was the best of the lot.
The legendary quartet of Leonard, Marvin Hagler, Roberto Duran and Thomas Hearns dominated the boxing landscape throughout the 1980s, as they each took part in epic battles with one another.
Leonard has the honour of being the only one who was able to beat the other three, though he wasn’t able to go undefeated against his rivals after suffering a loss to Duran.
While he may have come up short against the Panamanian icon, Leonard sided with another of the prestigious boxers as being the best, telling Ring Magazine that he believes Hearns ranks above the others.
“It was Tommy [Hearns]. I don’t think anything matches our first fight.”
Leonard fought Hearns on two occasions, the first of which coming in September 1981, where ‘The Hitman’ suffered a 14th round stoppage loss in their welterweight world title unification.
The pair collided again at super-middleweight at the end of the decade, with their June 1989 ending in a controversial split decision draw, though many onlookers believed that Hearns had done enough to win.
It’s clear why Leonard views Hearns as being the best that the ‘Four Kings’ had to offer, with ‘The Hitman having had an illustrious career which saw him become the first boxer in history to win world titles in five divisions.
Those triumphs came at welterweight, light middleweight, middleweight, super middleweight and light heavyweight, as Hearns finished with 61 wins from his 67 professional fights.
