A question about the fab 4

Duran was already a lightweight champion when I started following boxing, so I can't comment on him.

Hagler was a regular on national boxing shows in the U.S. in the 70s and was very popular with boxing people and he received favorable coverage in boxing mags. Not so much with mainstream sports fans. In the 1970s, boxing people and fans knew who guys like Hagler and Marvin Johnson were, but they weren't big sports stars like players on major sports teams. They were just boxing names. Nowhere near the level of the welters - Leonard, Hearns, Duran and Benitez.

Hagler was respected, like Briscoe was respected. I don't know if anyone thought he was a lock to be a champion. The middleweight title didn't change hands much back then.

I remember it was surprising when Antuorfermo outpointed Corro for the title. Vito was just "a guy." He'd been around forever. Corro's loss was an upset. When Vito defended against Marvin the first time, it seemed most thought Vito would lose. When it went 15 rounds and ended in a draw, I think a lot of the shine fell off Hagler. It had been his big opportunity, and Vito was a beatable champ, and Hagler didn't win. (And a lot of people at the time thought Vito deserved the nod.)

When Hagler got a fight with Minter, I don't recall anyone saying Hagler was a "sure thing." Minter had destroyed Vito in their rematch. Minter was the bigger man. But the way Marvin destroyed him, it was pretty surprising (as was the post-fight riot).

Marvin was one of those guys who needed the "name" guys from the lower weights to move up in order for him to raise himself to the next level of stardom. I don't recall Marvin really becoming a "name" - like household name - fighter until the Duran fight.

(There had been talk of Leonard fighting Hagler before Leonard retired. But they hadn't fought. So Marvin sort of remained a "name" among boxing people only.)

I remember both Hagler and Duran jumped rope (of all things) on the stage during some program on TV that didn't have anything to do with boxing, and some matchmaker at the time thought maybe Duran could compete with Hagler. No one had seen them together before. And there didn't seem to be much of a size disadvantage. If I recall correctly, one of them (Duran or Hagler) was a substitute for another boxer who couldn't make it. So, if they hadn't been on that show (can't recall what it was) they may never have fought.

Then Marvin fought Duran, and the same thing sort of happened as it did with the first Antuorfermo fight. Marvin had a guy he should've been able to dominate, and he didn't. It was razor close. So people started second-guessing whether Hagler was really an "elite" fighter.

It took the Hearns fight to really lift Hagler up. Also, most of Marvin's title defenses were taking place on HBO back then, and in the early 80s, very few people had HBO.

Looking back, Marvin didn't really become a HUGE sports star until Hearns, and he only fought twice after that.

Hearns was young, very early 20s, when he destroyed Cuevas. I'd only seen him a few times on TV before that. But the Cuevas win was HUGE, because Cuevas was a FEARED champion. I mean FEARED.

Before the Cuevas fight, people thought Hearns had a shot. But most thought the first guy who landed would win. When Hearns won, he was already talking about winning titles all the way up to light heavyweight. He was so young. Everyone knew he was special. And everyone knew he wasn't going to be a welter for long.

So, I'd say YES for Hearns and NO for Marvin. People did think Hearn was going to be great. On the other hand, Marvin wasn't actually considered GREAT by most sports fans until his third-to-last fight. And he didn't really prove he was an all-timer until he was close to the end of his career.

Side note: The original Fab Four in boxing were Leonard, Hearns, Duran and Benitez. I still have magazines that list them as such. I don't think Hagler replaced Benitez in that grouping until a video was produced after Marvin beat Hearns that included Hagler and left Benitez out. So every time I read a boxing thread like this about the Fab Four, I have to see who they include in their Four. To me, it's Benitez and not Hagler.

 

It would have been interesting had Hagler fought Benitez (regardless of who won) and would Benitez have made up the Fab 5. That is all which was missing was his fight against Hagler. But at that point, it doesnt look like he would do well against Hagler.. Not after Hamsho. He did great at 154, but at 160 he moved up a bit too much and he fought the wrong guy. Now if we take the 154 pound Benitez in 1982 and he fights a 156 or 157 pound Hagler? That is different. That is a pickem fight.

 

Everyone knew Duran from all his fights and lightweight. Leonard also from the Gold Medal and Dundee. Hearns? He was known coming up as a tall big puncher who had a great amatuer career and he had a lot of hope. And he fought on TV a lot in those days and fought Curry and Weston etc. Hagler? A little obscure but he worked his way but and managed to get there struggling and when he made it he never let go. Benitez being the youngest to ever win a title gave him some recognition.

 

1 st I call the group the fab 5. Everyone seems to omit Benitez for whatever reasons. Hearns was well known and thought of because of his frightening destruction of Cuevas, Duran, even at that time was considered a ATG at lightweight, some considered him the GOAT at that weight. Hagler began to come into his own , after the destruction of Minter, and the unfortunate aftermath of that fight. Benitez got a lot of attention because of the age he won his 1st championship and he was very likable. All 4 were well known to fight fans well before their fights with Leonard. They were usually on tv when they fought. If their was no Leonard, they would still be known to fight fans because they were all great fighters.

 

My take:

Of course the OP didn’t want Leonard addressed, but he was a darling from the Olympics who was brought up perfectly facing different styles and challenges by the time he fought for a title. There were many who thought Wilfred Benitez might be a bit too much for him but he overcome ... regardless, most people thought he was a can’t-miss future champ on the way up (had he lost to Benitez, he’d have surely found the mark against someone else at some point).

Probably only the sharpest of insiders (like those who knew Ray Arcel and Freddie Brown and listened to them preach the gospel of Duran) really knew who Roberto was when he fought for the title. He was pretty much an untested Panamanian with a couple of notable wins (Kobayashi who was a former champ moving up in weight after being KO’d in his previous fight and Ernesto Marcel). He burst on the scene against Ken Buchanan. He was a ‘best-kept-secret’ at best. A suspect who suddenly became a star.

Thomas Hearns was like Leonard Lite, sort of, in that he was brought up at sort of the edge of the spotlight before he KO’d Pipino Cuevas. He got USA television exposure and his punching power was evident, but he hadn’t quite been tested and was fed some shopworn guys who were somewhat names (Bruce Curry, Harold Weston, Clyde Gray) and a still-considered-viable Angel Espada. Whether he was the real thing, and whether he had the durability to succeed at the world championship level was still a question, but it was probably a likely thing that he’d become a champ.

Marvin Hagler was considered the uncrowned middleweight champion by the time he won the title, but it was a question of whether that was just a good hype-job billing of a not-quite-it guy or a sure thing. When he blew his first title shot against Vito the Mosquito there were some who probably wrote him off, but it was sure he’d at least get another chance to prove himself as a championship-level guy. And Marvin made the most of it. He rose to superstardom the blue-collar way ... HBO invested in him and he kept chopping guys down until he rose to become a marquee attraction.

 

Bruce Curry wasn't a shopworn guy. Curry was a peer of Leonard and Hearns. He was a favorite to make the U.S. Olympic team. He had more than 300 wins as an amateur. Bruce fought Leonard (the eventual Olympic Gold Medal winner) in the Olympic Trials and lost.

And Bruce was only 21 when he fought Benitez twice and only 23 when he fought Hearns. He eventually moved up to 140 and became a champion there. Duran was actually supposed to fight Benitez in a non-title fight when Bruce stepped in as a last-minute replacement after Duran pulled out and Bruce nearly pulled the upset (if not for the judges).

Bruce Curry actually performed better against both Benitez and Hearns than Duran did. His problem was his temper. Donald Curry was considered almost docile. Bruce Curry was a raving maniac. Huge temper problem.

And Hagler wasn't considered the uncrowned Middleweight champion except on maybe the east coast of the U.S. He became the #1 contender when he defeated Briscoe in 1978 and got his title shot in the fall of 1979, when he drew with Antuofermo. That wasn't a long wait. He was just the top American middleweight contender when the Middleweight division had been ruled by fighters from other countries for a decade or more. And Vito beat him to the belt.

Hagler's didn't became a real "star" until the Hearns fight. Then he had two more fights (one the controversial upset to Leonard) and people, in hindsight and rightfully so, viewed him as an all-time great.

But, during his reign, he struggled to gain attention. The main thing he had going for him was the middleweight title he won was unified. That helped him stand out the little he did stand out. Most of the other titles were split. Boxing was still being televised on the national networks in the early 1980s. Fighting on HBO limited his exposure. The vast majority of the country didn't have HBO. His defense against Caveman Lee was the only national exposure he got after beating Minter. Had the middleweight title been split, he may have been largely ignored.

Marvin is a guy whose rep only grew once he retired.

In some ways, Joe Calzaghe had a similar run. Nobody outside the UK really thought Joe was any more special than any number of champs back then until the end of his career. The Lacy win brought him a lot of attention. Then the Roy Jones, Bernard Hopkins and Kessler fights elevated him. And his rep grew in retirement. But those fights all came towards the end of long career.

 

Was Donald and Bruce Curry natural brothers. One story says they were real brothers than another that they were step brothers.

 

Great post. Right on about Hagler. Perfectly captures h I s situation.

 

Well, they had the same dad and lived in and the grew up in the same house. There were three Curry brothers and three Curry sisters. If Bruce had a different mother, she didn't raise him and wasn't in the picture (as far as I know). They all grew up together.

 

I heard that they were not true brothers, but they looked alike. So they were brothers. Half brothers. That would have been interesting had Hearns fought Donald, he would have fought both Currys.

 

The shine was already off Curry: four losses to that point and wasn’t distinguishing himself against the journeymen. He gave Benitez a good fight but came up short but was at best a gatekeeper already. He may have gone on to win a lesser belt (the junior divisions at the time were not considered on par with the eight traditional weight classes) but the victory was not hailed as a major accomplishment for Hearns.

In fact, Tim Ryan mentions during the Hearns-Curry fight that most insiders thought Curry’s war with Monroe Brooks had taken a lot out of him. That’s how he was regarded. Good opponent to showcase Hearns, but not a title threat at that time.

As for Hagler, Sports Illustrated was already writing about him as a contender. Champs were avoiding him. He had to wait longer than usual for a title shot. His promoters had to overpay ranked guys to come in and take their whuppings from him.

https://www.si.com/vault/1979/07/09...e-a-battle-with-the-belligerent-marvin-hagler

Yes, HBO invested in Hagler and built him up. He certainly didn’t reach star level until Hearns but this thread isn’t about who was a star at what point, it’s how they were considered before winning titles.

 

Wrong. He was, at best, a world champion.

 

Again, I said he may have been considered a title threat on the east coast of the US (which is where Sports Illustrated is located) because he was the top American middleweight and there hadn't been an American world champion for a dozen years or so.

Hagler wasn't rated above Corro when Corro and Valdes fought for the title. Corro made a couple of defenses before he was upset. Then Marvin got his shot and didn't win.

Nobody was saying Hagler was a lock for a title ... especially after he fought for the title against a very beatable champ and didn't win it.

 

Not at that time. You could have gotten some pretty strong odds if you had been willing to wager on his future. Heck, for the price of a used car you probably could have bought his contract.