Hagler vs Leonard - Who had the advantage?

Don't think it says much of anything about it, aside from Benitez being the one who preferred to face Leonard for the title in favor of the emerging Roberto Duran for 1) the money and 2) he actually considered him an easier fight at the time. Not that it really matters, you know why? Because if Leonard had beaten Cuevas, today's limp wristed couch critics would be claiming how SRL ducked the skilled, agile defensive master Wilfred Benitez in favor of the more crude and limited Jose Cuevas. Anything to fulfill their little wet fantasies of all the fighters who made him cower in fear... Alledgedly.

As for the time the fight made sense:

After Leonard won his first world title by stopping Benitez for the WBC welterweight title in November 1979, there loomed an obvious candidate for a big money fight, and his name was not Roberto Duran. In early 1980, the mexican welterweight Jose "Pepino" Cuevas was boxing's longest reigning champion having won his WBA title in 1976 and defended it on ten occasions.

A showdown between the two 147-pound claimants seemed not only natural but inevitable, and the ground work for the fight was laid by Leonard's first WBC title defense, a fourth round one-punch knockout over England's Davey Boy Green in March of 1980.

A deal for the Leonard-Cuevas fight had actually been reached, with the approval of both sanctioning bodies, but the proposed match-up rapidly began to unravel amid charges of backroom politicking involving some unlikely bedfellows.

Although Leonard was the standard bearer of the World Boxing Council, the organization was headquartered in Mexico, and WBC President Jose Sulaiman implored his countryman to step aside and pave the way for a Duran challenge to Leonard (a cynic might have noted Sulaiman's cozy relationship with Don King at work in these machinations: Leonard-Cuevas would have been a big fight on which King would not have made a single peso).

The World Boxing Association, whose title Cuevas held, was based in Duran's home country, and the military government there turned the thumbscrews on a pair of Panamanian officials, WBA president Rodrigo Sanchez and Elias Cordova, the chairman of the organization's championship committee.

Col. Ruben Paredes, who headed up the National Guard of Panamanian dictator Gen. Omar Torrijos, paid a visit to the WBA offices and strongly intimated that it would be in Sanchez's best interests to pull the plug on Leonard-Cuevas. Paredes represented the muscle of Torrijos. Torrijos principal padrone was Carlos Eleta, Duran's influential backer.

 

Leonard beats Cuevas like he stole something, from light brown to beige-blue. Don King, Bandido Sulaiman, Il Padrino Eleta and La Familia de Panama spared him a $3 hair cut i.e. **** your head up, rented mule style, whoop ya head boy, different levels... Yah.

 

"Duran is a very gutsy fighter. He'll fight anybody, and I admire that. Guys like Hearns and Benitez and Leonard - If I hadn't been the middleweight champion they'd all of been up here. Instead, they've all been sitting on the fence like a bunch of vultures waiting for me to get old or get beat or retire, wondering who's gonna be the fool to go against Marvin Hagler first. Whatever you say about Duran, at least he wasn't afraid to fight me." -- MMH.

 

The TRUTH:deal The whole TRUTH:deal & nothing but the TRUTH:deal

 

Kimball wrote a pretty good book in all honesty. I just deplore the way the Fab Four era has come to bring about a vast number of stereotypes and misconceptions regarding Duran, particularly as it pertains to his career and ability. You could only consider him prime for one year - one, in 1980 - from that entire decade. He was already a legend before any of the other cats really starting scratching the surface. 1980s Duran is oft times the only version people unfamiliar ever see, and while it's easy to just dismiss them as clueless ****s, the further widespread the notions become, myths start turning into widely accepted falsehoods which is why he's routinely besmirched and disrespected in the general forum.

 

Duran the shittest of the fab4. Not only in skill but mentally also

 

I think anyone in thier right minds would rather deal with a cutey like Benitez, than a habitual bone breaker like Cuevas

No speed. No punch

frankly I'm glad Sugar never faced off with Cuevas. it wouldve been bad, real bad. Worse than his loss to Norris or Camacho

seriously, who wants to see this :!: again?

the sport needed someone to fill the shoes of the retired Ali and who makes a better clone than Sugar Ray Leonard?

not as tough as Muhammad, lacking the charisma, seemingly leery of certain opponents, & without the chin but overall more talented & almost as intelligent

 

Maybe they did look for Benitez first, rooster. Either way, it's a great scalp regardless of who it was, and he was going to inevitably have to deal with Cuevas. Kimball breaks it down nice and neat above -- Leonard ended up having a serious problem on his hands with Duran and Hearns stepped through to splatter Cuevas in between SRL-Duran I & II. You don't duck a unification bout with Cuevas only to end up fighting Thomas Hearns in a unification bout -- He had more power than Cuevas, better boxing skills than Benitez that combined with physical attributes made him one of the most dangerous welterweights of all-time. You'd be hard pressed to find a majority who feel even Ray Robinson could outbox that freak (he'd of needed a KO too). I'll leave it like this: Leonard was going to go through whoever he had to at 147 to establish himself as the top dog in the division and marquee fighter in the sport. Doesn't matter who could've been there, he was going to do what he had to. At Welterweight. Hagler is a totally different matter.

 

I think I'm David Icke man I know I'm David Icke.