Roberto Duran. Overrated or what?!

Dude it had little to do with what Duran was doing...If you had seen the build up you would have known that Ray was going to fight that way because he said "Im going to beat him at his game" Duran got under Rays skin, and won the battle of the minds before the fight ever started. Ray being a young hot head fall into the trap. What Im saying is that a peak or prime fighter would have never did that, dont you remember when Duran was trying to lure Ray into a slugfest in the second fight Ray kept shaking his head NO,NO,NO....that was because he was a more mature fighter and he know that wasnt his fight...:hey

 

I dont know about everyone eles but this is all im saying....I personally dont have him in the top 10 but he is just outside..I think that last time I did one I had him at 12, and behind Leonard.

 

he is already top 10 just be his lightweight career...top 5 after the leonard win but bump out of the top 5 when he quited against leonard...

imo, his moving up with weight didn't do much...He is still outside the top 5

 

i would say that duran is overrated past 135 career...
he is not an ATG if we took away his LW career

 

Hearns walked right thru him, like he was a joke. So did SRL in the second fight, and very few of Duran's 'great' wins are so great when you take a close look at them except the first SRL fight. That's IT, and that's what Duran's whole legacy is based on. ****... people give Cotto, KT and Wlad **** for staying on their stool after a long brutal fight and try to completely gloss over what Duran did against SRL, like he was somehow being macho for avoiding the beating he saw coming.

JCC would stomp a mudhole in his ass.

 

so now a three division champion is overrated

 

From bantamweight to lightweight,that's 60% of his career.And from bantamweight to 147,he only lost two times,once to DeJesus and once to Leonard.

 

If you have ever boxed, you know the quality of this man. Just one of the best ever.

 

So many worthless posters in one place.

 

Leonard was very clearly in his peak by the first fight. Any ****** who saw the Benitez fight over a year prior knows this. Unfortunately, we aren't dealing with just any ******s here.

 

"Virgil Hill's reign was better than Duran's lightweight reign"

"SRL wasnt in his prime in the first Duran fight"

"JLC would stop Duran"

those are just three examples of the dumb **** being said by some clueless ******s on this thread.

 

From another thread I posted on.


I'm not one of these people who come to the conclusion that Leonard somewhat fought his normal fight in Montreal. Yes, prior to the rematch in New Orleans he wasn't known to move around the ring like he did that night, but he had the athletcism and the ability to make things easier when he fought Duran the first time. Of course I give Duran credit for the win. I'm not saying he only won simply because Leonard stood and fought. But Leonard clearly had it in him to use his feet and get out of trouble more than he showed.

Leonard was physically bigger, had more natural power at the weight, and was quicker, along with height and reach advantages. This doesn't point to him slugging with Duran as perfectly sensible strategy. I'm not saying this with the benefit of hindsight. Leonard and all his camp knew that Duran's best chance was a war. Everyone had it marked down that Duran would be coming forward and looking to suck Leonard into a ball testing competition.

If you watch the fight, you'll notice that Leonard is flat-footed. Very seldom does he try to move out of harms way and skip away with lateral movement. Centre ring, spurts of foot movement, rarely stepping to the side to avoid Duran's charges. And I really don't care what others say about how he fought prior to the fight, Leonard had the ability to box and move far more than he showed on the night. No, I'm not asking him to have showed a carbon copy like he did in New Orleans and get on his bike. Duran obviously gets credit for taking a grip of the fight and fighting how he planned.

Leonard never listened to his corner by all accounts. And Duran got into his head during the press conferences leading up to the fight. Insulting Leonard's wife and saying he was going to kill him. The whole occasion got to Leonard and he openly admitted afterwards that he was intimidated by Duran.

Just for the record. Duran sucked Leonard into fighting his fight. He prevented Leonard from even considering trying to box on the move, far less even try it. But Leonard, IMO, fought the wrong fight. As I said, I wasn't quite looking for him to move to the full extent to which he did in the rematch. But lets be honest, Leonard had the tools to get himself outta there more often than he did. Hell, even the press were shocked when they asked Leonard how he would fight Duran, to which he replied "stand and fight him". All the press thought he was mad.

If Leonard was at his best, fought his normal fight, and was simply beaten without any excuse whatsoever, I guess the press and fans back then in 1980 knew something some of you guys never. Cause nobody else had Leonard rubber-stamped for a flat-footed battle of Machismo with Roberto.

 

Why did he fight absolute bums at such an old age?

Was he broke or something

 

:blood