Duran explains why he quit (April 1981 Ring interview)

This is a brilliant answer.i agree with every word. Id probably also add the dennis andries win altho nowhere near elite as a good win over a grossly underated 3 time LH champ.A 185 lbs hard to kill specimin that lil tommy lil 162ibs tommy pulverised.

Id say theres no question the duran who lost to Benitez was well trained and deternined,the fight being close imo but benitez beat him well...duran didnt fight anywhere near to his best level like vs hagler or srl 1 but it was a good duran..a duran neutralised by benitez .the same duran who beat moore and barkley.duran was not shot or old in any way for the benitez fight...just for the first time in his life post montreal he was super rich,he had won a superfight and most importantly being 147-154 and not 135 meant duran started coming in less than peak shape and hunger/meanness post montreal......that resulted in a more lazy ,slower ,apathetic duran at times...eg laing,no mas, but he was close to his best nentality shape for Benitez.

the hearns loss i say was a clear wipeout, the freak like hearns at the zenith of his power,speed snd boxibg ability was just kryptonite for any version of Duran, altho ironically the humbled slower patient duran of the Barkley fight imho May have done a lot better in getting inside smothering making a slower pace

 

Amen, I was on the East Coast back then, cleared $1300 on the Brawl in Montreal and did not bet on Duran to win in New Orleans after word on the street rocked in early September 1980, straight out of the gyms in NYC and Miami, that Duran was at 201. All the reporting that fall noted the same thing. So, Duran went from 201 to 147 in roughly 2 months and as is well-known, and was reported, Duran was in the steam room the day before the weigh-in, so he could make weight. He was so drained for the fight in New Orleans, he just looked wasted. No excuse, of course, he signed for the fight and it was on him. Montreal was Duran's finest hour. He was a man on fire that night and remains the only fighter who ever beat Leonard, in Leonard's prime.

 

Its pure crap. The film shows Leonard was hurting him to the body and landed a sharp uppercut in the final round. Duran is a bully type. It wasn't his night. He wanted to quit rather than get stopped.

 

Changes nothing. Duran took Leonard's left jab away in Montreal. Duran was the first, and as far as I know, the only fighter who ever took Leonard's left jab away. After round 4, Leonard stops throwing his left jab, because Duran had--like no other fighter who'd ever fought Leonard before--slipped Leonard's jabs in rounds 1-4 and landed counter-rights. Leonard, rounds 1-4, throws his left jab, Duran slips it and nails him with right hand counters. Nobody had ever done that before to Leonard, which had to be discouraging to Leonard, who had one of the best left jabs in the history of boxing. In counterterrorism, there is a saying: Get ten steps ahead of your enemy and stay ten steps ahead of your enemy, and you will drop him and stop him. Duran was ten steps ahead of Leonard in Montreal, before they even stepped into the ring. Duran had a brilliant strategy--slip Leonard's jab, land counter-rights, and when in doubt, land lead left hooks, go to the body like Marciano on speed and keep beating Leonard to the punch. Notice the lead left hooks that Duran throws and lands throughout the fight. Leonard wasn't looking for those, either, and more to the point, neither was Dundee. Leonard had never faced a fighter with Duran's skill sets, ferocity, tenacity, guile and "you may want to win but I need to win" conviction. Moreover, Duran out-thought him and out-fought him, but of course, it's a helluva' lot easier to take the other guy down when you out-think him, first. Pragmatic is clever and clever is wise. In Montreal, Duran was profoundly pragmatic--take the other guy's jab away--and profoundly clever, with those lead left hooks and counter-rights. Watching that fight now, it's still amazing to me that Leonard was standing at the end of 15, and a testament to Leonard's will and courage. Arcel smoked Dundee, no doubt about it, in Montreal. It's Arcel that trained Duran to beat Leonard, and Arcel who out-thought Dundee.

 

I really don't think it's a big mystery ... The party scene in NYC was more important to him .. Ray in the gym .. Duran at the party

 

I love Duran. I know he wasn't a coward and I know he wasn't afraid of Ray Leonard. With that said he was very stupid to let himself get out of shape to that extreme. He knew Ray was good. He knew that Leonard held on and kept fighting even though Duran hurt him Bad. He had to know RL was coming back with something.

I would have partied, I would have drank, everything but then get back to business.

Maybe it was the idea of the $10 mill he was gonna get.
It's all speculation.

Leonard won, he deserved it.

 

Ray was smart. Sometimes the guy who do the mind games are susceptible to them back,and Duran was.. Ray tried it with Hearns and it didn't work as well because Hearns did not play mind games much... And Ray did a reverse mindgame with Marvin, being nice and acting like his friend. He pushed that so much,, you cannot go into a fight thinking you are fighting your friend. Which is why Ray didn't want the rematch with Marvin. Marvin would have been mad and he fought his best when he was motivated as most people do.

 

And there were only a few seconds left in the round. He could easily survive till the end of the round. Why didn’t he finish the round and then confer with his corner?

 

this should be called The excuse Duran gave for quitting.

 

What? How does being slower make him better?

 

You okay man? You seem really bothered about a subject that's almost 40 years old now, like it happened yesterday...

 

Only in the world of clowns

 

Right. Fair or not the term " No Mas " lives on, primarily attached to Duran.

Duran fans to me are full of excuses.

He lost to Benitez ( at age 30 ), a very good, but perhaps not truly elite level fighter, and was upset by Laing at age 31

He wasn't in shape vs. Hearns, they say, while okay, being in shape has little to do with it. Duran was down in round one and dazed, he went to the wrong corner after the bell sounded. Hearn's completely overwhelmed Duran in round two. Roberto went down again, this time face first.

IMO, Leonard was close to stopping Duran, which is the real reason why he quit. His body was telling him something...

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I agree with this Mendoza … Could be same reason Liston quit against Ali.. At 35 yrs old, just being outclassed and wanted to save himself from the beating … But he doesn't get the pass as some give to Duran

 

Well, Leonard certainly had the edge at this point. Leonard was very proud of the fact that he tricked Duran into fighting when not at his best, so of course Duran was having a miserable time and was was going to lose, but an imminent KO? I don’t think so. Certainly not in round 8, but anything is possible especially with fatigue in the later rounds.

People I know who watched the fight live at the Superdome were totally dumbfounded because it appeared to them that Duran was still very much in the fight at the time that he quit.