Next up for Leonard was Roger Stafford Russell. After that Aaron Pryor. The latter would have been a wild fight for a short time but the Hawks wings would have been clipped. It would have been interesting if he took on Hearns at 154. Pick em' fight. Eventually his goal was to move up to middleweight but it may have taken some time to get fully comfortable at the higher weights. Eventually it all culminates in a fight with Hagler, which he had anyways. Looks like you needed to hand out some tissues with the thread topic Russ.
I don't believe Leonard could keep up with Pryor since styles make fights and Leonard was never capable of anything more than fighting in spurts. He thought he had problems keeping up with a 29 year old lightweight jumping two weight classes, Pryor with his non stop attack, would have driven the control conscious leonard crazy.
If Leonard had not retired (and I do agree with the poster who said that Ray's eye was never a problem whenever Hagler struggled in a fight) he could have managed that greatest ever title for himself. Had he got into the following fights... Duran III at 147 Hearns II at 154 Benitez II at 154 McCallum at 154 I have a love-hate thing with Leonard. he was a truly great fighter but he did manipulate the whole situation in his favour. The refusal to rematch Hagler and then come back again was pretty dispicable. he only rematched Hearns because Tommy was looking totally shot with no punch resistance.
Yet more proof of his reluctance to fight. Reluctance does not a great fighter make and showed he really couldn't cut it in the ring. Anyone who has seen the Hearns-Kinchen fight knows Tommy was damaged goods before the rematch and shows a track record for taking fights for this reason ie; taking the Hagler fight 5 years late. Never had Tommy or Marvin given worse performances and resembled shells. Coincidence? I think not.
You can start as many Leonard threads as you like, and I'll be happy to participate in all of them Russell. Leonard is my main man, and I never get tired of talking about him...
Nice, thank you. What do you feel the most dangerous fight for Leonard around the time his serious inactivity started? Julian Jackson? Nunn? Norris?
To be honest I find it hard to believe Leonard would beat Hearns at 154. Hearns hung with Leonard the whole fight and as you know was winning at the time of the stoppage. Tommy was great at welterweight, real good, but he was even better at Light Middle. Everything was perfect, what could Leonard do differently that would give him a chance, considering that Hearns exhaustion was a major factor in Leonard winning the first fight, I don't see it happening in the rematch.
Hung with Leonard? He was dominating him until the body work and weight drain combined to wear Hearn's down and out.
He wasn't dominating but yes he was in command of the fight. I'm really not a fan of the weight draining excuse, you don't box like that for 13 rounds whilst drained. Hearns hadn't done 15 rounds before and its difficult for most fighters to go 15, not considering he was boxing and moving aroudn the ring for a large portion of the fight, and that is very tiring itself.
Look at how the man looked, Arcel's comments before the fight had even begun, his infinitely better performance at light middle, and how tall he was while being at that low of a weight. He was definitely drained.
I think all of the above would have been dangerous, but my pick would be Mike " the body snatcher" McCallum. My reasons are that he was arguably a better defensive fighter than any other man Ray ever faced, and was equally superior when it came to working the body. This would be a totally different species that Ray had never dealt with before. In the end, I'd still pick Leonard to take a decision, but it would be a very tough and dangerous match.
Leonard's faulted for fighting in spurts, could McCallum's workman consistency spell doom for Leonard?