I think he beats Toney because of work rate Toney was a good middleweight but left the division before he started to become great....Hagler in 87 was struggling to get up for fights and my feeling on him at this time was unless he had been too dominant his entire reign and even with slowing down Roldan, Mugabi too huge punchers couldn't do anything with him.....I just don't think he saw Leonard as anything more than a huge payday but doubt he saw him as a real challenge.....so where I am going is Hagler needed to fight someone as mean as he was with a sense of losing to get his intensity going.
I was going to say the same thing - workrate would be the difference, at least it certainly would have been with a prime Hagler v prime Toney. If Toney at his best at MW (arguably in the first fight with McCallum) dropped off his activity in the same way, my assumption is that Hagler would make him pay. But this was '87 Hagler who had slowed down a bit so maybe he wouldn't have been able to take advantage as much as he used to. I think this is a very close fight. The best version of Marvin definitely beats Toney, the '87 version edges a decision.
no. Marvin was simply too slow and with no power. It would be close with Toney outhustling an aged, hittable hagler
