Marvin Hagler vs Ray Leonard

[Rocky Balboa]

I have heard and read that Leonard would not box Hagler over 15 rounds and that he would not grant him a rematch after the 1st bout. Is this true?

If so, can I have some predicitons on what would have happened had they fought each other again?

Cheers.

[turn2stone]

Could have been 15, but Hagler took the money. Also took money to give Leonard a bigger ring. MMH likely didn't think these concessions would make any difference to the outcome, which of course was to supposed to be a Hagler knockout.

[jsc1973]

Leonard did refuse the fight over 15 rounds, which caused one sanctioning body to withhold recognition and another one to strip Hagler of the title. Basically, Hagler wanted the fight so badly that he conceded the champions' rights to Leonard. Then he fought a stupid fight for the first four rounds and Leonard ended up "winning" on two of the three cards. And finally, Hagler wanted a rematch and Leonard "retired" for a while until Hagler got sick of waiting, so he retired himself and became a movie actor in Italy.

Years later, when Leonard launched one of his comebacks against Hector Camacho, he tried to lure Hagler out of retirement to fight him again. Hagler was so disgusted that all he said was "I already beat you once, why should I bother again?"

For the record, I scored the fight a 115-all draw, IIRC I scored it 1-2-3-4-11 for SRL, 5-6-7-8-9 for MMH, 10-12 even (Leonard controlled the ring in round 12, but did too much preening and not enough fighting). I can see a very narrow decision for SRL, if you don't go on the premise that you have to take a man's title away from him. The judge that scored the fight 118-110 should have been banned from boxing.

[Dave1armedTua]

This topic would be better suited in the boxers of the past forum. Or rather, fraudulant guys with alot of good PR and money forum.

[pringle]

hagler should have been glad it wasn't 15 rounds; that's 3 more rounds of beating he didn't have to take...

[kojak]

It's true Hagler agreed to a larger ring and 12 rounds instead of
15. However inorder for the fight to happen he took the concessions.
Good for the fans but bad for Hagler. Bad in the sense he didn't get
the rightful decision. But for financial reasons good for him. At the
time that was the biggest paying fight out there for him. No other
fighter could've made him the kind of money a Leonard fight did.
And not making the concessions would have doomed any chances
of the fight taking place.
Looking at the fight I had Hagler retaining his title. Leonard did a
lot of showboating. And since Hagler didn't destroy him the way
most people thought, the emotions of seeing him standing gave
some people the illusion that he was winning. And all he did was
survive. Sure he fought back in spurts but each round is three
minutes, not twenty seconds toward the end of the round.

[joeyatwal]

one of the judges had the scoring 118-110, so the extra 5 rounds may not have made much of a difference, cause one of the ringside judges obviously was affected by the late round stealing flurries...but u never know, hagler was capable of coming out with a KO...

[crooked nose]

This one should have happened in '82, but SRL balked. Leonard was always good at using his star status to buy concessions from opponents, a tactic that taints his reputation during his comeback escapades. As Hagler so eloquently stated during the bout, "Fight like a man, you little bitch!"