Leonard-Duran 2 and 3 are incredibly underrated wins

I watched these 2 the other day after many years, if you haven't seen them recently or not at all I highly recommend the second fight. Duran was 71-1, just beaten Leonard giving him a nasty beating and on the basis of his career at this stage is rated as a top10 an all time P4P lists and . Duran said he was going to KO Leonard this time.

Leonard drastically changed his gameplan, fought to his strengths movement, controlling the pace and range with his first punch, ie get the jab working, and holding at mid-close range. Some people say Leonard tried to do all this in the first fight, PURE BULL****, he just didn't employ these tactics. If you can't see Leonard fought a different fight in the rematch, you're dumb, simple as that.

Duran still had cat like reactions, fast feet, fast hands but Leonard was using very fast evasive movement that didn't let Duran get set and didn't let him get in punching range, some will call it running. I was pretty impressed Leonard managed to dance for 8-9 rounds like that, if you've boxed and tried that type of movement you will know it isn't easy to do that for long. Leonard new he couldn't fight Duran at mid-range and have a hope of winning.

1 bull**** statement I've heard about this second is (the fight was close, each had won about the same amount of rounds). I thought Leonard won pretty much every round and I think thats why Duran quit, no one had outboxed him round after round like that before, he was getting embarrassed and didnt like losing

Now the case people put against Leonard was he picked a quick Duran rematch because he knew Duran was out of shape after the win. In actual fact Leonard didnt even want a rematch but his manager pushed for it.

So anyway wait a miniute is this the first time Duran blew up between fights? Or did he always blow up eating crap and getting pissed senseless and work like a demon to get the weight of?

What evidence is there that this Duran isn't every bit as good as the Duran of the first fight? Leonard effectively using different tactics and outboxed him. Thats the only real proof. Some say Duran **** him self but I haven't seen any evidence of this (ie his shorts). I'm not saying Duran wasn't quite as good but far too much is made of this, maybe he wasn't but he was still Duran and Leonard's wins is 1 of the best in history

This brings me to Leonard-Duran 3, Duran just became a MW world champion beating Barkley, Leonard really just lost to Hearns (who lost to Barkley). They both weigh 160 but fight for the SMW titles. Leonard wins a 1 sided decision putting on a bit of a masterclass and giving Duran a bit of beating at times. Duran was past his prime at 38 but so was Leonard at 33/34 (I forget) and Duran had just became MW champ and his fans love to shout about the Barkley win while ignoring Leonard's win here :-(

I'm a big Duran fan but these constant excuses have become a joke, Leonard proved himself the better Welterweight and both his wins over Duran are excellent, the second fight is a great win

 

I've heard people say 'That wasn't Duran, the last we saw of the 'Real Duran' was the Brawl in Montreal'

 

I actually bought into Duran was past it for the rematch before and not the same before, when you haven't seen something in a while you believe the myths.

Now I rate both wins on par with each other. Duran won when it was at mid-range setting things up with his jab and footwork. Leonard won when he continually used lateral movement setting things up with his jab and movement.

However Duran's is the macho win, Leonard's the tactical boxing win. Duran gave Leonard a beating and Leonard couldn't do the same to him, even if he fought a 5 fight series and won 4 of them he still wouldn't have given Duran the same type of beating from 4 fights as Duran gave to him in 1

 

Interesting fact, thanks for that