1978 Roberto Duran vs 2003 Floyd Mayweather jr. 15 rds @ 135

When we're talking about about fighters on this level, the little things matter.

It's similar to the concept of "evidence based medicine":
1. Duran lost to De Jesus near his prime and without injury
2. Duran lost a little too easily to Leonard when Leonard employed a box and move strategy
3. Duran lost to Benitez when past prime but still very good

Duran did beat Leonard, but in my opinion it was because Leonard purposely employed a strategy that involved standing in front of Duran and fighting aggressively. If Leonard entered the fight with the intent of sticking and moving he'd win.

The evidence that Duran could win basically comes down to Mayweather's performance against Castillo the first time. However, in that fight Mayweather fought through a hand injury to win 7-5 or 8-4 (imo) against
a peaking version of the most accomplished lightweight of the last 15 years. He won the rematch more easily.

I think there's more evidence to suggest that Duran would lose. That doesn't mean that Duran couldn't fight movers, but he'd be in against one of the best ever.

Sidenote: Mayweather shutdown a prime Canelo while deep into his thirties and giving up a huge amount of weight. You can jump on me all you want for this, but Canelo is going to go down as a better 154 fighter than Duran when all is settled.

 

I find it very funny that Mayweathers fans are talking about Duran in his later career ABOVE the weight that thread is asking for predictions from us. Duran at 135 was an animal, what he did as he climbed the weights has NOTHING to do with this thread. So big deal, he lost to De Jesus in a non title 10 round fight. What did he do about it? He stopped the guy twice afterwards. Furthermore he was comfortably ahead at the time of stoppage in both those fights.

Mayweather is never going to stand in front of Duran and trade the way De Jesus did, and at 135 Duran would be both quick and ferocious enough to catch up with Mayweather if he tries to hit and run.

No way can he beat a prime 135 Duran.

 

When Duran left the lightweight division he was 71-1 let's see Maywaether post a record like that before criticising Duran's one loss.

I was watching Duran - De Jesus II yesterday and Ferdie Pacheco was comparing Duran to the likes of SRR, Ali etc. and Duran was only 20 at the time. And the funny part was that he still wasn't at his absolute peak as a fighter yet.

And losing to De Jesus is nothing to be ashamed of but for Duran I think he would have ruled the lightweight division for quite some time.

For me the bottom line is Mayweather-Pac at their peaks may have somewhat resembled this trilogy and say what you want about the one loss Duran had, he also had the balls to get back in the ring and fight him twice more. Where were Mayweather's balls when the Pac fight was there to be made?

Had Duran been around today he would have fought both of these fighters no doubt about it.

 

This ends up being the bottom line. Mayweather ready doesn't have anything to beat Duran with. He's not going to outbox him and when Duran was in his prime he could throw vicious combo's all night long and I don't think Mayweather has an answer for Duran's determination, power, speed, combo punching and ferocity.

 

Tbh, that is all that needs to be said on the subject. ( as far as 135 is concerned.)

 

Vanboxingfan you have my respect. You're a great poster.

 

As said by people who know their boxing on this thread, at 135 no way is 135 Floyd even giving prime 135 Duran a tough fight. It just would not happen. Not in a million years. This thread is dead now.

 

Thanks, same here. :good

 

1. Duran had an off night in the first fight which can happen when you are that busy, he was caught cold and hurt in the first round. He proved this by stopping DeJesus in both rematches.

2. Easily? It was actually still a close fight before "No Mas" and irrelevant to this thread.

3. This thread is asking for 135, not above 150.

Leonard was trying to move in the first fight, he couldn't get away, full credit to Duran's feints and foot work. And since you are taking the "hand injury" route, one could easily say Duran's cramps in the second fight was the only reason Leonard was doing better, it was still close before "No Mas".

That's absurd, why would you only look to the fights of one man. That is rather incomplete analysis. The evidence for Duran is him, destroying excellent boxer movers at 135.

How enlightening and bold of you to make such a prediction. A thus far careerl 154 lb is going to go down as a better light middle than a man who fought over a decade as a light weight and spent all but maybe two years of a 30+ year run in the divison. :nut

Even than I disagree. Duran at Light Middle beat Davey Moore. That's a better scalp than anybody Canelo has right now.

Moore was a devestating ndefeated boxer/puncher, who destroyed Benitez unlike anybody has before. Duran took him apart and nearly killed him.

 

Lara> Davey Moore

You claim I'm being one sided, but I'm not. I was discussing loses. Floyd has none. Also. there's plenty of evidence that Leonard intended to fight aggressively in the first fight. There was a thread on it either here or esb recently.

If you want to talk about bias, I have to point out that you just defended a man's performance in probably the most high profile quit job in boxing history. (Floyd didn't no mas against Castillo, Chavez, etc. He beat them.)

 

Excellent post.

 

You are going to have to do better than a simple ">". Davey Moore demolished a 26 year old Bentiez, who had just went the distance with an all time offensive juggernaut in Hearns. Lara has lost to Paul Williams and beat Trout. The undefeated Moore was going places before Duran derailed him.

Simply "not losing" isn't evidence that one is invincible and incapable of losing. Plenty of undefeated fighters like Calzaghe and Marciano are picked to lose in fantasy matches. You can't just present the "0" and expect it go unchallenged without analysis. Yes, Duran lost to Jesus, but he also took him apart twice.

Fight aggressively from range. Yes. but not get forced into exchanges at close quarters. They didn't want Leonard to just run, they wanted him to establish some offensive because Duran had a reputation for eating boxer/movers up.

No, I'm just pointing out how flawed and untrue your statement was. You stated that Duran is only being picked because of Mayweather's "injured hand" against Castillo. That is not true. You know that is not true.

You are comparing 1-13 Chavez and Castillo to a prime Ray Leonard? Yeah, I don't think Duran would "No Mas" against them either, cramps, hand injuries..etc.

 

Lara would not beat Davie Moore especially pre Duran Davie Moore who was very highly rated and knocking out everybody, the most impressive being his hard fought 10 round TKO of the excellent if slightly past it at the time (40-1-0) Ayub Kalule who's only other defeats came at the hands of great fighters like The Body Snatcher and SRL who he caused problems. Kalule also beat the brilliant boxer Sumbu Kalambay by close fought SD the fight before he retired past his best after being defeated in 10 by prime on fire at the time Herol Graham.
After Duran destroyed Moore he was never the same again but he still beat the great Wilfred Benitez in 2 but we wont look too much into that as Benitez was way past it.

Now lets look at Lara's padded record :-( Who the **** has he beat worth a ****. Trout is basically average so Lara does not get huge credit for that win. Lara just lost an SD to Alvarez who's a basic box punching plodder with decent punch variety. None of those guy's could lace the gloves of even past prime versions of Kalule and Benitez.

As for no mas that was a disappointing fight from both camps and a lot closer than arm chair fans like to think. Two judges had SRL up by 2 after 8 the other had him up 1 after 8. I had it a bit wider for Leonard. Leonard did a lot of running and show boating and not a lot of landing. Duran on the other hand done a lot of chasing and not a lot of landing as he was not as conditioned as he was in Montreal. A fact admitted by both Duran and Leonard's camps. Leonard's negative tactics and Durans lack of drive and preparation he had in Montreal made it a total disappointment of a fight. Oh, and Duran did not say ''No Mas'' he said ''I'm not fighting this clown''.

 

Undefeated usually means you haven't fought very good opposition or you've cherry-picked. Fight consistently tough opposition and chances are you'll have a few losses along the way. That's boxing. Besides that, despite his cherry-picking, Floyd isn't undefeated anyway. He lost to Castillo, an inferior Duran.

Makes me laugh seeing Duran being ragged on for his losses when Floyd would never go near the likes of Leonard and Hearns. Come to that, I doubt he'd fight Duran either. Would he even fight De Jesus? He'd fight Gatti or someone like that and then claim the Fab 4 were unworthy of facing him because he was undefeated and they weren't.

 

You beat me to the post. well done.

I was going to point the same: at the bottom end, Maywather's fans always go back to the same simplistic argument: he is "undefeated", therefore he is TBE, he would defeat Duran, Hearns, Hagler, SRR, SRL, etc.....