The Myth About Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran

Duran > Leonard

 

it's not the layoff. 5 months isn't enough

but I do recall a story in which Roberto put on too much weight

He never quite looked the same peak physical condition after the first bout

 

But Duran was using trickery too. He insulted Leonard's wife and got him all angry and macho to try and go to war with Duran instead of boxing. If that's "fair and square", then so is pressuring a guy to do a rematch when you know he's partying irresponsibly.

 

Psychological warfare but Leonard MORE than evened the score. He sent Duran into a depression!

 

Leonard didnt schedule Duran to come in unprepared.
Duran did.

 

Duran’s condition was not Leonard’s problem.
I never liked this ease people take credit away from fighters.
Like what he did was easy or something.

 

1) but apparently Leonard admitted he took advantage of Duran's partying so it kind of cancels itself out. Either they're both using trickery to gain an edge or neither of them did.

2) I'm not saying it's the same, but in both cases they're doing things to make the opponent more compromised and not at their peak condition intentionally. Duran, a seasoned veteran of boxing, staying away from junk food and drugs should be a bit easier than controlling your anger when someone insults your wife by the way.

 

I thought Duran himself admitted he talked trash to Leonard to get under his skin. We don't really need to know if Leonard is a reliable source in this case. Look at the press conference footage. Duran was Mayorga before Mayorga.

 

Right. Won't persuade the "fake news" conspiracy theorists, but it seemed pretty convincing to me...

 

Duran was in shape.

 

Frankly, the idea that Leonard saw that Duran put on a lot of weight and scheduled the fight in November to catch him unprepared is so silly that I'm surprised people take it seriously. Even without the timeline that I put together, it's a childish story and illogical...doesn't pass the smell test. But a colorful story and motivated reasoning trump common sense and critical thinking 9 times out of 10.

 

Except he probably considers it flattering to the extent that it makes him look shrewd and smart. Especially after so many people (rightly) criticized him for fighting a dumb fight with a dumb fight plan the first time around.

 

This is the truth, saw the same thing. Arcel even spoke of delaying the fight but Duran's manager Eleta said even if he loses we'll get more money in a third fight. This was the beginning of a funk Duran was in for a few years , one he didn't come out of till the Cuevas fight. The difference in Duran's performances after the age of 30 were literally night and day, it was so obvious sometimes that he wasn't properly prepared to fight, and as you say that's all on him. Looking back whenever Duran made really big money he slacked off, Leonard 1, After Hagler, and I thought he looked dull against Sugar Ray in the 3rd fight. He fought a good fight against Pazienza in the first fight and I thought he'd won, but in the second match he looked like he trained on his couch. Hindsight is fairly clear on him but at the time of his fights you never really knew if he would show up ready to fight or not. One quote by Ray Arcel on Roberto speaks volumes," If he had trained and stayed in shape like Barney Ross he'd have never lost"

 

I think it was obvious Duran didn't have the same intensity for the rematch. However, that's his own fault.