Sugar Ray Leonard Quotations | Page 2

This kid [Janks Morton, Jr.] was so special, although he's not a kid anymore, obviously, but he was there from day one of my rise through boxing. You know how the years go by and then, when you stop to reflect, you realize that someone was a part of your whole evolution as an individual? That's what I share with Junior.

I wouldnt change anything because the mistakes and the hurt are as important as all the great fights. They made me who I am today.

Tommy Hearns seemed like an indestructible machine, so to beat him, I think that was my defining moment, the pinnacle.

A fighter never knows when it's the last bell. He doesn't want to face that.

I lay around and wonder why you were always there for me.

To be honest, I don't know. I started one [book] back in 1982 or '83 when I first retired. But I was only 25 or 26 and not ready to write my memoirs.

I wanted to be like Bruce Jenner.

I found boxing when I was 14 years old. I went down to the gym because my brother, who used to beat me up all the time, introduced me to boxing. I found boxing to be a sport that I felt safe in because I controlled what was in those four squares.

My ambition is not to be just a good fighter. I want to be great, something special.

I enjoyed [Celebrity Ghost Stories]. I never thought in a million years that I would tell people that I saw a ghost. And I've seen a lot of ghosts.

Look at football, where you still have injuries no matter how much they improve the helmets and other equipment.

The only way for a fighter to get back in shape is to fight his way back.

It was a whole different world, and Montreal was an absolutely beautiful setting unlike anywhere I'd ever been before. So, Montreal in '76 was an encompassing experience I will cherish for the rest of my life.

I only wish that I had had the courage and the knowledge to have gotten that out of my system, out of my mind or my heart years earlier. But there is no book, there is no manual to tell you how to deal with sexual abuse.

I'm so opposite of my profession. No one - particularly my mother and father - ever thought I was going to be a boxer because I always felt that football and baseball were too dangerous. I was just such a quiet kid.

I want to be great, something special.

I consider myself blessed. I consider you blessed. We've all been blessed with God-given talents. Mine just happens to be beating people up.

I saw Todd Bridges talk about being abused on Oprah. Something that he said, or an expression that he made that gave me that little boost I needed to be open about it and to talk about it as transparently as I did. When I told my wife, she couldn't believe it. She was petrified, because it's such a no-no, taboo, a hands-off subject. But I'd have to say hearing Todd Bridges on Oprah was my watershed moment.

It is wonderful. It truly is. It is the only thing that is real! It's you against me, it's challenging another guy's manhood. With gloves. Words cannot describe that feeling of being a man, of being a gladiator, of being a warrior. It's irreplaceable.

My intention was to fight Durán ASAP because I knew Durán's habits. I knew he would indulge himself, he'd gain 40–50 lbs and then sweat it off to make 147.

While each of us faces enormous challenges every day, it's not the sins we commit that will define us, its how we respond to them.

I retired and came back in '97. Woo! I mean, come on! I don't know, man. A six-year layoff? That was crazy! My career was relatively short, whether you look at either its length in years or the number of fights I had. But it was brutal.

I always expect unexpected challenges.

I learned how to sumon, from somewhere deep within, the extra will I didn't know I possessed. Knowing it was there, and could be tapped again, gave me the boost of confidence I would rely on for years to come.

Everything you want to know about a fighter is in his eyes. The look in his eyes tells the truth.

I'm not in favor of that [mandating protective headgear ] because we learn as amateurs how to protect ourselves. And that's why there's a third man in the ring, the referee. And that's why there has to be a very strong boxing commission that doesn't allow guys in the ring who don't belong there.

When I was 15 or 16 and I started climbing up the ladder of success in amateur boxing, a reporter asked me, "What do you want to be?" I think he was expecting me to say, "A champion." I said, "I want to be special." I don't know why I said that, but I didn't just want to be a fighter. I wanted to have an impact with people, particularly kids.

When we got back to the U.S., I wanted to kiss the ground after seeing what people in other countries are denied or don't have.

I learned that I had character defects, that I was allergic to alcohol and drugs, and that I had an obsession with all the bad stuff. But thank God that I woke and that I had good people around me to support me. There's not much more I can say about it. You have to want to be a better person.

My toughest fight was myself. For me to disclose and let things out was not easy because we don't want to seem weak or like we are different, but I learned that it's okay.

I've always believed that you can be whatever you want to be if you are willing to sacrifice and dedicate yourself.

You don't play boxing. You really don't. You play golf, you play tennis, but you don't play boxing.

Inactivity is the biggest sin in boxing.

You have to know you can win. You have to think you can win. You have to feel you can win.