Curry V McCallum in 1985

Curry was struggling with making 147lbs as far back as 1982. Four years before he lost to Honeyghan.

He balloned up to 168 between his fights with Rodriguez and Honeyghan, and was 158lbs a week before he squared off against Honeyghan.

On Curry changing his training camp to New Orleans. Goram said, "When a guy is trying to make weight he should be working in a dry climate, not a humid one. Humidity saps too much strength. And besides all that, fighters are creatures of habit. Change isn't always good".

--------------------------------------------------------------------

"Based on everything I had seen prior to the fight, I can honestly say the loss wasn't a total surprise" Says Dave Goran, Curry's manager. "But even so I still felt he'd win"

Also two weeks before the Honeyghan fight, Curry stated to his advisor it would be best get a fight at junior middleweight and call the fight with

Honeyghan off as he felt he could not make the weight. His adviser stated "Donald, I think you have the professional obligation to go ahead and make the weight and fight".

He was advised by manager Goram, and three other camp associates to move to 154lbs after his fight with Rodriquez, and he stubbornly refused stating "I liked being one of only two undisputed champions" he said "I don't want to give up my title after winning it".

Curry also felt six months without a scheduled fight and six months out of the gym hurt him. "I think the long lay off hurt me" Curry admitted "Its the reason I went up to 168. I should have stayed busy".

Gorman was not with Curry until three days before the fight, as Curry asked him not to come to training camp because they had an on going contract problem together.

Goram also stated "Everything done in training camp was different" and the manager adds "I didn't think he had enough carbohydrates in his diet. And I know he didn't take any potassium tablets. Those are simple things I never overlooked.

 

Mike would eventually catch him and take him out. Curry's defense was never air tight, even at his best, and it would need to be to beat McCallum.

 

Curry's D was just as good as Mccallums when Curry was at his best.

 

Mccallum wasn't ducked at all.He didn't fight Hagler because he was a JR MIDDLEWEIGHT and Hagler was a Middleweight.Ray Leonard was retired and only coming back for huge fights and at the time Mccallum wasn't a huge fight.Hearns was trying to rematch Hagler.
What people forget is after Mccallum defeated Curry he got his ears boxed off by Kalambay which Mccallum then lost any chance of having a big name fight.
Mccallum was known as being a pain when it came to trying to make fihts with him.He priced himself out of alot of bouts or was always switching promoters/managers that nobody really wanted to deal with him.That was Mccallum's fault.

 

Boxings inner cirlce considered him a "head case", yes.

 

That alone wasn't necassarily the reason why they never fought. Those divisions are next door to each other. Duran and Hearns were jr middleweights who moved up and fought Hagler. Same with Mugabi. I personally think the reason why Hagler and McCallum never fought was because they weren't on each others radars.

No way would Hagler have been seeking a fight with McCallum between 1984 and 1986. If anyone was pulling for that fight it should have been McCallum. And I don't think his people were in contact with Arum about the possibilty of the fight taking place. Hagler's standing in the game was on a different planet compared to McCallum's during the mid-80's. And fights with Duran and Hearns brought more money to the table. And IMO Hearns was a tougher fight for Hagler than McCallum, who was relatively unknown and green at the time.

McCallum seems to hold resentment towards Hagler all these years later. He likes to think he was 'ducked' but he wasn't.

 

Mccallum never moved up and challenged Hagler.He stayed jr.middle and defended his title.Had he moved up the fight would have been made-remember Hagler was running out of challengers.

 

Yeah, but his chin never was.

 

Yeah, he did get floored in his title winning effort in 1983, always wondered what happened there.He was fortunate Bobby Joe wasn't able to further dent it for him.