Duran: was 2nd rd KO loss to Hearns worse than "No Mas" fight?

The no mas was disappointing but the Hearns execution and its finality was chilling.
Duran poleaxed and face down on the canvas with the glove imprint on his cheek will forever remain in memory.

 

Being koed by an all time puncher like Hearns is no disgrace and does not alter Durans standing all time. Quitting in a bout as he did where he was seamingly uninjured and physically unhurt is a huge black mark. It's for the historians to decide if the rest of Durans career outweighs quitting as he did in his bout with Leonard.

 

I agree wholeheartedly. No Mas was the antipathy of Duran's warrior credo. I suspect if he could take one back it be the NO MAS debacle.

 

The other thing to consider is Durans best weight was at lt weight. Against Hearns he was at 152 pounds.....way beyond his best weight. Losing to Hearns at that weight as he did has no effect on his all time ranking.

 

No mas was worse by far. He was simply overwelemed by Hearns. Went out on his shield. But to quit in a fight your losing but still competitive in..... There is no excuse for that. ...

 

How can it be worse than "No Mas"?
Against Hearns he went out on his shield against a much bigger guy who had devastating power.
With "No Mas" he quit.

 

Duran was in absolutely no condition for Hearns, he speaks about it in his new book, he was on drugs, booze and zero training a lot of revealed in his new book. IMO a conditioned Duran with focus could have done as well as Barkley had he been better prepared but Hearns was no joke and never an easy fight. Duran would have to fight a perfect fight and work on flaws and openings that Hearns had in order to emerge victorious.

 

From what I have read Duran was always a bit weary around Hearns who was naturally way bigger. Read I to that what you will but Duran was way past his best when they fought.

 

The Leonard rematch was worse. It wasn't like Duran was taking a horrific beating and then quitting, or even being dominated. He was getting outboxed and taunted, but it wasn't like Leonard was dominating or even hitting him that consistently. There was one instance where Leonard throws a shot and Duran ducks it, and in real-time, it looks like a clean shot. When you watch it carefully, and in slow-motion, you see Duran's great defensive reflexes at work.

Duran wasn't taking a beating, wasn't being badly outboxed, wasn't dead-tired. He just quit or had some sort of mental breakdown. He was getting paid $8 million and just quit because his opponent was "dancing around like a clown". Then your job is to cut off the ring and get to him.

 

What it means is Leonard never hurt Duran, rather Duran quit out of frustration. I'm 100% sure that if Duran could change one thing in the boxing ring in his career it would be that. He either would have lost and gone down fighting, or he would have found a way to win, but he wouldn't have quit, and it is extremely unlikely he would have won, but he might have went the distance.

I firmly believe that in his mind at the time he had it in his head that fighters were warriors and they actually fought and when Leonard started taunting him and humiliating him, it seriously wounded his pride, so much so that he wasn't prepared to be humiliated for the next several rounds, which is what he thought he was in store for.

Personally, even though there's nothing technically wrong with it, purposely humiliating another fighter isn't cool. Put another way, in hockey fights they basically have an unwritten code, and in boxing they do too, and that code is beating someone is fine, knocking him out, sure, that's part of the game too, but humiliating a fighter? As far as Duran was concerned, that wasn't part of the code, it was something you just didn't do. But all that said, it was Duran who started it in the first fight when he pointed to his chin and then hit Leonard with a jab.

 

Right, which is why it seemed sort of silly for the other poster to deny that Leonard humiliated him.

Not the "Duran as Noble Warrior" stuff again! Duran did just fine when Viruet clowned around and taunted him in the ring. He also didn't seem too noble to say repulsive things about other fighters and their wives before and after their fights... So with all due respect, please spare me.

 

You have to actually comprehend what you are reading. I said two things. One that this my opinion of what Duran was thinking and two he did the exact same thing against Leonard.

 

No, this has been completely discarded. His trainer Freddie Brown felt his had to come up with something, and so this is what he came up with. No he was just frustrated for a bunch of reasons. He felt he never had the time to prepare properly for the fight as a result he never had the energy or the power he had in the first fight, he felt that Leonard was clowning him, and he felt that he was getting embarrassed, and for someone with Duran's pride, getting embarrassed was far worse than getting KO'd. So in a moment of anger he just threw up his hands and basically said I don't want to fight with this clown anymore. But at the time, (ie within about the minute in which it took place) he certainly wasn't aware of the ramifications of his actions, or he never would have done that. But I do believe it's something he regrets to this day, but as someone once said, you can't change yesterday.