Benitez's victory over Duran

Its all about styles, benitez will always beat him. Duran had no problem beating cuevas, barkley and moore cuz they played his game and went toe to toe.

He beat ray leonard when ray decided to go toe toe with him, that didnt exactly happen in the rematch.

 

Hearns went toe to toe with him also.

 

I don't believe Duran would ever beat the Benitez he faced at 154.

 

Benitez was a very fine fighter and a bad clash of styles for Duran, he always would be. Simple as that.

 

One of my fave fights ever. I still shudder when I picture that big right hand from Tommy chopping Duran down for the count. Nobody else massacred a prime Duran like that.

 

What about Duran right after moving up from 135, lets say at 140, would the wonderkid as he was at 140, be able to do that

 

Duran could beat Benitez at 140 or 147. He would need to set a frantic workrate and smother Benitez with body shots.

By the time Duran met Benitez his body could no longer fire at that kind of level. He was picking punches much more and his power, so evident at LW, was nowhere near what it was. Duran had also lost 2 beats of speed which was one of the things that set him apart.

All the physical traits Duran needed to win had ebbed away or simply deserted him. He could still beat aggressive fighters who came to trade. He could outbox and outmanouvere these guys. He could counter them. Duran changed his style to give him success but he could no longer beat master boxers and defensive wizards.

 

But what about when he was a lightweight? Didn't he have to chase down a few fighters? Buchanon, Fernandez, he had to force the fight to win.

I think Duran was too fat and slow, too lethargic at that weight. he had no fire and it showed.

 

Duran ducked Benitez for years. Teddy Brenner, who was Madison Square Garden Matchmaker and a major player in both Benitez and Durans careers tried to match the two for years but Duran's manager would not take the fight.

 

I have a hard time believing that considering some of the monsters Duran got in the ring with.

 

One of two fights I wagered $500 on (the other being Holmes/Cooney).

Of course both Wilfred and Larry were odds-on favs (below even money) so I got back considerably less than the amount of my wager.

I remember one judge in that fight had it razor thin for Benitez. We were thinking: "what's that idiot smoking?"

 

Benitez would have been carved up at 140. he's damn lucky Duran's manager opted not to take the fight.Best on best it's Duran thats the bad style matchup for him;he's even better defensively.

A guy like Villa could shut the young Benitez' offense right down by being technically sound and cagey.Duran just tore him to shreds in a ridiculous display of slipping and countering.

At 154 on the other hand Benitez was simply better.

 

Theres almost no one better then Benitez defensively, he has arguably the best defense ever. Duran had a great defence but it wasn't on the level of Benitez. Whitaker, Locche and maybe Jones jr are able to be compared. Thats about it.

 

But none of those fighters mentioned were "offensive" as Duran either. Duran was one of the few to seamlessly combine offense & defense together.