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FROM THE BOOKS
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In
the early days of his career, Marvin Hagler was told by one of
boxing's resident cynics that he had "three strikes against
him." He was, so the naysayer said, "black, left-handed, and
good." But this time the prophesy, always one of the most
gratuitous forms of error, was wrong on all three accounts:
Marvin Hagler is more milk-chocolate than black; ambidextrous,
not left-handed; and great, not good. Then again, Marvin Hagler
never has been fully understood. He came from that crucible of
greatness, the streets. Not just any streets, but the mean
streets of Newark. Burned out of house and home when the city
was trashed in 1967, his father already a memory, Marvin was
bundled up by his mother with the rest of her brood and taken to
Brockton, Massachusetts. There Marvin ran with the troubled and
the troublesome, kids without presence or future. But Hagler had
both. And he had a dream, a dream that someday he was "Going to
be champion," an ambition he gave voice to the first day he
visited the Petronelli Brothers' Gym in downtown Brockton. |
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Bert Randolph Sugar-The 100 Greatest
Boxers Of All Time
Marvin Hagler ranked #74
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