Relating to sports activities, Sugar Ray Leonard could have lastly met his match.
After professionally boxing within the ring from 1977 to 1997 and successful 36 out of 40 fights, the retired athlete revealed which sport is more durable than it seems: Pickleball.
“It is competitive,” Leonard, 69, completely instructed The Submit on the 2025 Emmys Pickleball Slam Fundraiser on Could 18. This can be very aggressive. I identical to to take part. I don’t play that properly, I’m not that good however what? I care. I actually care.”
Relating to taking part in pickleball or some other sport, the skilled boxer has one sound piece of recommendation: “It’s all about the heart. Do that.”
Leonard — who was inducted into the Worldwide Boxing Corridor of Fame in 1997 — revealed that certainly one of his secret weapons when he competed was he “drank a lot of coffee.”
In 2021, the Skechers spokesman mirrored on his time within the ring, and the 1976 Olympic Video games in Montreal the place he took house the gold medal in gentle welterweight boxing.
“Words cannot describe the feeling that I had,” Leonard instructed Individuals.
Touring to Canada for the competitors additionally marked his first time leaving house for an prolonged time period.
“I was nervous as heck,” Leonard confessed. “I was so proud of myself. I wanted to go home, but I wanted to stay to bring home the gold medal first. It was just an amazing point in my life. I was like 20 years old and when I look back, that’s been like eons. 50 years ago.”
It nonetheless holds as one of many writer’s proudest moments he’s skilled.
“It’s the most precious moment in my career, in my life,” gushed Leonard. “I never forget that moment. Representing myself, representing my country. And it wasn’t about fame and fortune.”
That medal is now saved in a security deposit field, however he has let these closest to him attempt it on.
“When some friends or just individuals come over sometimes I’ll show it, let them take a picture of it around their neck, ‘Here you go. You get one around your neck,’” Leonard defined.
The star needs these competing within the Olympic video games to recollect one factor: “I tell them 100% to believe in themselves because if they don’t, no one else will.”
“This is your opportunity, this is their chance for success, stardom, and accomplishment,” he elaborated. “People can say I was a world boxing champion professionally, but when people say I’m an Olympic gold medalist, that speaks volumes. That is precious. There is no amount of money that can pay for that. You can’t pay for it. You have to deserve that. You have to go for that.”
All through his profitable profession, Leonard additionally struggled with substance abuse. He opened up about getting sober whereas on “Oprah: Where Are They Now” in 2016.
“There’s a part of me that is a good man, an honest man,” he shared throughout a sit-down. “And there is Sugar Ray Leonard – who is ego driven. Who is a tough SOB in the ring. Who had money. Who had fame. And at some point, didn’t really appreciate it and took advantage of that.”
Leonard recalled his first spouse, Juanita Wilkinson, whom he was married to from 1980 to 1990, saying, “You are two different people.”
“I would get angry about that and go and have a drink,” he stated. “But then when my present wife, Bernadette, said to me, ‘There are two of you,’ I knew there was a problem.”
He received extra candid about his previous infidelity, substance abuse and childhood molestation in his 2011 memoir, “The Big Fight: My Life In and Out of the Ring.”
“Many many moments, many many nights or days I would wake up and not remember what the hell just happened at night,” Leonard stated on Winfrey’s OWN community. “I always knew I had a problem, just never admitted it to myself. I never believed it. And that’s deadly, that’s wrong. One day I woke up — nine years ago I woke up — and life couldn’t be better.”
