Are Hagler's title challengers underrated?

Duran stayed at LW and saw off about as many challengers as Hagler did at MW. Than he did more.

It was a close fight, so I have no problem with you thinking Hagler won. But narrowly beating a rusty past prime WW isn't that big a deal.

Well, we'll have to disagree about that.

 

How about Ray Leonard against Don Lalonde ?

 

Well, you hypberbollically said "Duran had two of boxing history's greatest wins" outside of LW.

Barkley had been soundly beaten by Kalambay. He was getting destroyed by Hearns but cracked Hearn's vulnerable chin.

It was a very good win for Duran, but not some all time great win.

Now, if he had managed to beat Hearns, Kalambay, Nunn or McCallum - that would have been more impressive than beating Barkley.

 

Oh.

 

Guillermo Jones-Lebedev
Dingaan Thobela-Glenn Catley
Roy Jones-Ruiz
Toney at heavyweight
Floyd-Canelo
Hopkins--Tarver, Pascal, etc
Vinny Paz, etc

It happens in differing degrees. The problem is that you can't elevate Duran too much based on his ability to get one good win after poorly conditioning himself for years on end. He wasn't that old when he beat Barkley compared to others. He'd mostly ended his prime with poor conditioning. The guys with longevity at the top trump that part of Duran's career.

 

Really? At what point does size and strength come into it?

Regardless of your opinion of Hagler's inside abilities he's going to get beaten in there by a Qawi and size and size are going to come into it very strongly.

What if Duran moved up to 175 and got beaten by Qawi on the inside? Beaten by skills again? What if he fights Tyson? Tyson's skills on the insdie allowed him to beat Duran in there?

At what point does it become too much? Duran was a natural (great) lightweight fighting a natural (great) middleweight. For me it's a no brainer.

I'm using common sense.

It's really very simple for me - it's a skillful big man at his peak against a skillful little man well past his peak. Realistically Duran should have been beaten in a more dominant fashion.

I have never in all my life seen Hagler above Duran on any respectable ATG list. He should never be placed that way and isn't. Duran invariably makes top 10 and sometimes top 5.

What Duran did post SRL 2 is icing on the cake. He was a small man fighting well up in the weights. He was up and down a bit and not as consistent as Hagler for obvious reasons. Hagler never even moved up so what happened with Duran post 135 is over and above Hagler.

I feel extremely comfortable putting Duran a level up, as can be seen by his consistenly high placings on various ATG lists.

Not going up has got to count against him vs others that did so with great success i.e. Duran.

 

Not with Duran at 137 1/2 and De Jesus at 138. It was an over the weights fight at Junior Welter as it turned out.

 

I agree.

I agree. Hagler's greatness certainly doesn't rest on the SRL fight. Far from it. I had Hagler winning 115-113 or 115-114, and I consider it a 'blemish' on his record nevertheless (and a credit to SRL's record).
But every great fighter has a few poor results or performances.

 

Exactly.

SRL-Lalonde is often regarded as a throwaway win on SRL's record, a gimmick win. The hype it received at the time is better forgotten. The two titles at once, to give SRL his historic 'five' is, and always was, laughable.

Duran-Barkley, a fight that occurred just a few months later, has been elevated to the loftiest heights.

But I wonder .....

 

I'm guessing it was a lightweight bout but both failed to make weight? They both came in well under Junior Welterweight.

 

Size and strength always comes into it. If it's there, it's there.

I've seen the Hagler-Duran fight and Hagler used his skills, on the inside. He skillfully covered up as he closed, skillfully landed accurate uppercuts and skilfully mixed in those digs to the body.

I don't know what more to say on that.
I don't care to argue about a hypothetical Qawi-Hagler fight that I admit I haven't even bothered to make much effort to visualize.
I certainly don't have time to explain the difference between Hagler-Duran and a Tyson-Duran scenario.
Let's say I probably rate Duran a better middleweight than you do, and a greater welter than you do. Which is strange, considering how high you rate him p4p.

You either see Hagler's skills against Duran, or you don't.

It's a glass-half-full or glass half-empty argument.
I think Hagler's performance and result against Duran was good. I think Duran's performance was admirable.
Hagler looked like he had more in the tank too.

Yes, I'm aware of the list orthodoxy.

I agree.
Some people might actually hold SRL 2 against him, quite a lot though.

Also, some people might say the several poor results and performances in the years 1981 to 1989 balance out the few impressive ones, and judge him that way.
Rather than selectively looking at the good ones and declaring it all "icing" at that point.
At age 30 to 37 Duran was past his best, but not evey great fighter is losing to Kirkland Laing types just a couple of years after their prime either.

I mean, I tend to agree with you but I'm flexible enough to see the merit in the points I've just raised.

Yes, you haven't trangressed the orthodoxy and you should feel extremely comfortable.

I think I've covered this.
Either way, I do rate Duran a notch ahead based on his welterweight wins.

 

Not dropped like Duran, but from accounts of his loss to Monroe, it would seem it was a much more one sided defeat than Duran's to Dejesus was.

He's more or less said to have been given a boxing lesson by the worm, though there's not much shame in that as Monroe was a skillful fighter and Marvin was still improving.

 

So a handful out of thousands and thousands.

Toney at HW are the ones I most agree with.
And I think those are great. But not even he had had that many fights.

 

But obviously you don't think it was there with Duran and don't overly think he was dimished inside comparative to 135.

We will agree to disagree on that one.

We can wrap this one up too. I think peak Duran was a better inside fighter than peak Hagler, you don't.

You didn't visualize the factors (weight, past prime, size, reach etc) going against Duran when he fought Hagler either

Well it seems a ludicrous question but rest assured it was warranted.

"Well Duran didn't look much smaller than Tyson, and he wasn't much shorter, i saw Tyson skillfully outboxing Duran in there, and, well, Duran's head didn't quite reach the ceiling from that Tyson uppercut".

I'm not so sure. I rate Duran brilliantly at 147 based on the SRL and Palomino fights.

At 160 he was ok, but realistically for mine should have been dominated by Hagler and he was very inconsistent. Well he was inconsistent post SRL 2.

It was incredible that he could turn around and put on such a performance against Barkley, even if he was a bit limited.

I must watch that fight again this weekend over a beer.

I don't know, maybe when he was up against Barkley he may have been able to beat guys like Sibson and Hamsho? Maybe they would have pressured him and worn him down a bit?

I see them, but i see them for what they are.

Carlos Monzon was critical of Hagler's tactics against both Duran and SRL. He said he fought the small men wrong. I agree. Monzon certainly knew how to fight the smaller men.

Hagler having something in the tank is due to going too easy earlier. I think he had a lot in the tank. I truly think he culd have stopped Roberto somewhere around the 10th.

If Duran was just another contender he would not have lasted imo.

I have no issue with that. I agree with them.

Some might, but those some would see SRR, Ali, Charles, Moore and countless others in the same vain.

Unfortunately not many of them retire at the right time. Hagler, Spinks, Lewis etc take a bow.

I too often play both sides of the coin.

Via my own observations and criteria i don't have too. You have Duran ahead of Hagler too, as per below.

I think we've gone as far as we can? We've both got our stances down and put up plenty of debate and points.

 

Actually i have won more question Unforgiven



Why do you think Duran was able to basically dominate and bully SRL on the inside but not Hagler?