Boxing should focus on pitting champion versus champion - those

The words of Sugar Ray Leonard, champion of the ring and legend of his age, resound with the clarity of both a fighter and a philosopher: “Boxing should focus on pitting champion versus champion—those are the fights that everyone wants to see. The sport also needs to work on developing new heroes and personalities. I’d like to see more vignettes on fighters, focusing on their lives, goals, and stories. Boxers need to be larger than life.” Here, Leonard does not merely speak of boxing as a pastime; he speaks of it as a theatre of human greatness, where struggle, identity, and legend must converge.

He begins with the call for champion versus champion. In these contests, the essence of competition is revealed. When the best face the best, the crowd does not only see fists and blows; they witness the truth of courage, discipline, and mastery. History remembers such battles above all: Ali against Frazier, Leonard himself against Duran, Hearns, and Hagler. These encounters were not just sport—they were epics, sung in sweat and blood, echoing like the duels of Achilles and Hector in the ancient tales.

Yet Leonard looks beyond combat to the soul of the athlete. He speaks of the need to develop new heroes and personalities, for without stories, sport is hollow. The body may fight, but it is the story of the fighter that makes the crowd’s heart beat faster. Heroes must be human enough to be known, yet great enough to inspire. This has always been true—whether in the Greek arenas, where victors were sung of by poets, or in Rome, where gladiators’ names spread like fire. Without story, the punch is forgotten; with story, even a single fight becomes immortal.

Leonard calls for vignettes on fighters—their lives, goals, and stories. In this, he touches the heart of myth-making. The fighter is not only the sum of his victories, but the child he once was, the hardships he bore, the dreams that carried him into the ring. When the world knows these stories, the ring becomes more than canvas and ropes; it becomes the stage where destiny unfolds. Just as the world admired Muhammad Ali not only for his boxing but for his words, his wit, and his resistance to injustice, so too must new fighters be known not only for their punches but for their souls.

The most striking demand Leonard makes is that boxers must be larger than life. Here is the essence of sport as spectacle. For the people do not only want to watch—they want to believe. They want heroes who remind them of the scale of human possibility, who embody something beyond the ordinary, who carry within them the majesty of gods and warriors. The boxer who is larger than life transcends his own body; he becomes an emblem of struggle, resilience, and the human will.

History proves Leonard right. When Jack Johnson rose as the first black heavyweight champion, his victories symbolized far more than the sport—they shook the structures of race and power. When Joe Louis fought Max Schmeling, the ring became a battlefield of nations and ideologies. These were fights that transcended sports; they became legends because the fighters themselves were larger than life, embodiments of greater forces.

The lesson for us is this: greatness is not only about victory, but about meaning. In every field—sport, art, leadership, or life—one must strive not only to succeed, but to embody a story worth telling, a spirit worth remembering. Compete with the best, yes, but also cultivate character, vision, and purpose. For the world does not follow champions alone; it follows those who become symbols.

Therefore, children of the future, take Leonard’s words to heart: do not live small. Seek to be larger than life—not through arrogance, but through courage, vision, and the greatness of your deeds. Strive not only for the victory of the body, but for the immortality of the spirit. For it is not the punch that endures, but the story. And the story is written by those who dare to be more than ordinary.