The Big Fight

by Sugar Ray Leonard

  “You might not like what I’m going to say,” I told Juanita that evening, “but you know that I want to fight Duran again, don’t you?”

  Of course, Juanita knew. She always knew. She knew before I knew. If I was deceiving myself by the jogs on the beach, I was not fooling her. The disappointment was all over her face, the tears forming before I could finish my sentence.

  As usual, I was too self-absorbed to console her. My mind was already on Duran, not her. Nor did she try to talk me out of it. She’d been around me long enough to know there was nothing she or anyone else could do when I made up my mind. I was as stubborn as my mother.

  The next person I told was Mike Trainer.

  “Mike, I want to fight Duran again,” I said. “I can beat him. I’ll fight my fight this time. He won’t know what hit him.”

  Mike did not get too excited. That wasn’t his personality. He suggested I relax and enjoy my time off.

  “Call me when you get home,” he said. “We can talk about it then.”

  I called back several days later. Once I decided to seek a rematch, Juanita and I cut our trip short and flew to Maryland. The vacation was over.

  What enticed me to commit every ounce of my being into a second fight with the dangerous Duran?

  Money was one reason. Money always was, given my upbringing. I could never put enough away. I would also need to make more deposits in Ray the bank, as the pleas for a “loan” weren’t about to go away. Everyone knew how much I made in the Duran fight. It didn’t matter that I lost. Giving them handouts to cope with the latest emergency still beat a confrontation.

  But money was not the overriding reason. If I never fought again, if my final appearance in the ring turned out to be my only loss as a professional, I would soon be forgotten, or, worse, ridiculed for walking away at the age of twenty-four. I’d never be able to live with myself.

  Mike was fully on board with the idea of a rematch, as were Janks, Angelo, and the rest of my team. Why wouldn’t they be? Another big fight meant another big check for everyone. There was only one valuable member who was opposed to a second Duran bout, and that was Dave Jacobs.

  By this stage, Jake had become quite bitter. He felt overshadowed by Angelo and it was easy to see why. Angelo received more credit for my growth as a professional, and more money. His name appeared in every newspaper and magazine article about me while few reporters gave Jake the due he deserved. From the day I walked into the Palmer Park Recreation Center as a scrawny, shy kid with the silly John L. Sullivan pose until the Olympics six years later, nobody worked with me as diligently as Dave Jacobs did. Without his guidance and dedication, there would have been no gold medal and no pro career. I would have retired at the ripe old age of fourteen.

  During the first few years after I turned pro, Jake didn’t come to me with any concerns over money, or his reduced authority, though I had heard from others in the camp how he felt. I decided to say nothing about it, hoping that time, and the success of the whole team, would make him reflect on his good fortune. Most trainers spent a lifetime in hot, smelly gymnasiums without grooming a champion or earning any real money. If he learned to accept his role, Jake would make a bundle.

  I was wrong.

  While I empathized with his anger, he failed to grasp the big picture. Angelo raised my stature beyond any level Jake could ever help me attain. Jake was a good trainer, but he was a novice in the highstakes world of professional boxing, and with the clock ticking, as it does for every fighter, I could not afford for him to learn on the job. Mike Trainer was a novice, too, but he learned fast. Dave Jacobs was no Mike Trainer.

  After the Benitez fight, Jake approached me with his complaints. We agreed to give Jake enough to keep him around though it seemed just a matter of time before his discontent would resurface.

  I went to see him shortly after I got back from Hawaii. Once we met in person, I figured, he would not be able to resist the chance for payback against Duran, whom he disliked nearly as much as I did. He knew what I did wrong in Montreal and would make sure it didn’t happen again.

  Our meeting did not go well.

  “The system will not let you win,” Jake insisted.

  By the “system,” I presumed he was referring to the boxing establishment, which did not approve of the way Mike Trainer did business, by shutting out the middlemen who were normally given a healthy percentage of the profits for doing, in many cases, absolutely nothing. In Jake’s opinion, that was why I had been denied the victory the first time and why the result would be the same if the second fight also went the distance. I could see his point, but I did not go to his house to engage in a long debate over the amount of corruption in professional boxing.

  “I don’t give a shit about the system, Jake,” I said. “All I care about is that I know I can beat Duran and I want you to help me.”

  “Son, you beat him the first time,” he pleaded, “and they still didn’t give you the decision.”

  Jake started to cry but the tears didn’t make him any less adamant. He would not be a party to a rematch with Duran—not without a tune-up or two, and that was not going to happen.

  I got up and walked toward the door.

  “Jake, I’m going to win this fight with or without you,” I said. I drove away, saddened at losing the support of a man who had meant so much to me.

  Once Jake was off the team, I didn’t look back. I only looked forward, to Duran. When asked by the reporters about Jake’s departure, I was quoted as saying there was, thankfully, “one less check” to write. Sounds very insensitive, doesn’t it? That’s because I was furious, and when I set out to hurt someone’s feelings, I can attack with words as mightily as I can with punches, and I rarely miss my target.

  To this day, I am convinced the system had nothing to do with Jake’s decision to bolt. He was seething, understandably, over his lack of authority. He had been demoted to third string behind Angelo and Janks, and this was his way to prove he didn’t need me. I brought him back for the Hagler fight in 1987 and several others, but our relationship was never the same after the breakup.

  The task for Mike Trainer was to get a deal done with Duran’s people as fast as possible. The rush was not due to any impatience on our part, although I was getting a little sick of being introduced as the former welterweight champion of the world. I still don’t like hearing that word today when I give motivational speeches around the country. I prefer to be called, simply, the champ.

  Contrary to what fans might have assumed, once I dealt with the initial disappointment of losing to Duran, I wasn’t in a constant state of despair. The urgency stemmed from the belief that the sooner we fought him, the better our chances of winning. Returning to Panama after the fight, Duran was greeted as a greater hero than ever. I was invited to attend the celebration but declined. I was not about to watch Roberto Duran show off the championship belt, my belt, as thousands of his countrymen cheered. For him the party never ended and that was a problem. In no time, Duran, who gained a lot of weight between fights, was at 180 pounds and climbing. If he were a stock, I would have purchased a thousand shares. Losing the necessary fat to slim down to the 147-pound welterweight limit would clearly affect his stamina.

  Mike’s job was tougher than it was the first time. The leverage we enjoyed as the champ during the negotiations for the duel in Montreal firmly belonged to Duran’s promoter, Don King, and you could bet King was not going to waste it. The man never left a dime on the bargaining table.

  But Mike was no pushover, either. He used his power—I was still the bigger draw in the all-important area of closed-circuit TV—to secure for me a guaranteed $7 million, only $1 million less than Duran’s purse. Better yet, the match was to be staged at the Superdome in New Orleans on November 25, just five months after our meeting in Montreal. Rematches between the top fighters have been known to take much longer to arrange. In the late twenties, for example, a full year passed between the two Jack Dempsey vs. Gene Tunney fights. Whoever
wins the original bout might squeeze in an extra payday or two against unranked opponents who pose no viable threat. The public might not approve but it’s a privilege the champ has earned and a reason why winning the first time is critical. You call the shots.

  First things first. Before Duran and I met in the ring, we met, of all places, on a set to tape a commercial for 7UP.

  I thought it was the most ridiculous idea ever when Mike informed me of the company’s suggestion. Duran and I in the same spot, with no one around to keep us from killing each other? The animosity between us was not contrived. It was real and it wasn’t going away anytime soon. And with 7UP’s representatives asking for Ray Jr. to appear in the commercial again, I was not about to tolerate Duran making obscene gestures in front of my six-year-old. He insulted my wife whenever he saw her. Why would I expect him to be any less vulgar toward my son?

  The money was good, so I went along, although I issued a strong warning to Mike.

  “If Duran does anything crazy at all,” I said, “we will be out of there so fast, you won’t believe it.”

  There was nothing to worry about. Duran, who looked as if he hadn’t missed too many meals, could not have been more professional and polite during the entire shoot. He treated Ray Jr. as if he were his own son, who also appeared in the commercial. The boys got along superbly.

  I was confused: Who was the wild man I saw in Montreal? Was it an act? Was I now seeing the real Duran?

  As I worked out and dissected footage of the first fight, my conclusions came swiftly, and decisively: I’d better make dramatic changes or history would repeat itself in New Orleans. More would be on the line than at any point in my career. A second loss to Duran might shatter my self-esteem, and box office appeal. Juanita wouldn’t have to ask me to retire.

  For starters, I could not afford to be overwhelmed again by the spectacle. By the time my attention was where it should’ve been in Montreal, on Duran, it was too late. He’d already seized control of the fight with his aggression in the first few rounds. In the minds of the judges, I was constantly on the defensive, and that was no way to retain my crown. No matter how effective I might be in countering his vicious attacks, and connecting with my own, for the duration of the fight, the initial impression was almost impossible to override.

  Another change I set out to make was to do what Ronald Reagan promised the American people he would do to the federal government if he was elected president in November—trim the fat from my bloated entourage. No longer would I give in to the pleas of my brothers for their homeys to be part of camp in Maryland and hit the road with us for the final weeks, especially with the fight being staged in the Big Easy. The boys would have held a Mardi Gras celebration of their own, and guess who would have paid the bill.

  To be fair, I could have said no to any one of them at any moment, but I didn’t, and the reason was because surrounding myself with as many people as possible fed an already oversized ego. I believed the clippings about my invincibility and wanted everybody to share in the glory of my next, most impressive conquest. If I could have afforded it, I would have put the entire population of Palmer Park on a caravan of buses to Canada. As I prepared for New Orleans, humbled at last, it was important to remember the most recent clippings, which weren’t nearly as flattering—DURAN BEATS LEONARD! I cut my entourage from several dozen to roughly half that size, leaving behind, as they say in government, any nonessential personnel. The Gipper would have been pleased.

  A more disciplined mental approach and leaner team weren’t sufficient. The most pivotal changes needed to take place inside the ropes. In Montreal, I proved to the critics that I would not back off for an instant. There was no reason to prove it again. I was desperate for a real victory, not a moral one.

  I would fight my fight, not Duran’s. That didn’t mean I would run in circles for the entire night to stay out of his reach. That’s not how the challenger seizes the crown from the champion. It meant I’d maneuver from side to side and not back up in a straight line. The objective was to keep the action toward the center of the canvas, which I did not do often enough the first time, and if I did catch myself on the ropes, I’d spin off.

  I also worked on refining my uppercuts. The way Duran went after me at close range, he left himself exposed to that particular weapon. I was glad to find out that the ring at the Superdome—21 feet by 21 feet—would be larger than the one in Olympic Stadium. The more room, the easier I could operate on the perimeter. I sparred fewer rounds per workout than I had in the past, and took a day off here and there. There was no point in peaking too soon and burning out.

  Another critical adjustment was to be ready for Duran’s dirty tactics, which was why sparring partners proficient in mauling were brought to camp. Leading the group was Dale Staley, the James Dean look-alike I beat as an amateur in the early 1970s. Staley was proud of his reputation, referring to himself as “the American Assassin.” He was disqualified twice for biting his opponent. Although I didn’t necessarily agree with his style of combat, with my career in the balance, I was not about to seize the moral high ground. I would have put Andre the Giant on the payroll if he could help me neutralize Duran. Staley, who idolized Duran, got the best of me for a while, but once I figured out his unorthodox moves, I slapped him around, fighting dirty for probably the first time. I must admit it felt quite satisfying to take him down at his own game.

  Several days before the rematch, Mike Trainer, believing I needed more instruction in spinning off the ropes, suggested that Angelo and Janks conduct a closed workout with me. No one respected Mike’s intelligence more than I did. Yet my first thought was: What does a white attorney from Bethesda know about prizefighting? Plenty, it turned out. He knew a great deal about psychology as well, selling the whole idea to Angelo by making it appear to be a publicity stunt. Mike knew Angelo wouldn’t be able to resist the extra attention once we told the press they couldn’t attend, and he was right. Then, as long as we were in the ring, Mike asked him to show me a few techniques. The key was to make the initial move the moment I sensed the bottom strand of the ropes brushing against my calf. I also worked on pushing Duran off me whenever he tried to use his head as a weapon.

  There was one more significant change in my approach to the rematch and it didn’t come from Angelo or Janks or Mike. The source was Roger.

  “Ray, you got to embarrass Duran,” he told me. “When you do, he will lose trust in himself and you will have him. Duran has to always be the macho man. Make fun of him, and he will not know how to handle it.”

  I didn’t pay much attention to his suggestion. I loved Roger but he was a drug addict who threw away a promising career. Make fun of Duran? The man was a killer. The fact that Roger suggested the idea proved he was almost as crazy as Duran. Yet over the next few days, I saw my brother try out a series of unusual moves in the ring, including the bolo punch first made famous decades earlier by welterweight champion Kid Gavilan. Before too long, I found myself experimenting with similar playful gestures. Roger had clearly gotten inside my head. I was not sure that was a good thing.

  In mid-November, I flew to Louisiana. I was fit, physically and mentally, although there were still moments of concern.

  What if a smaller entourage and smarter strategy did not lead to a victory on November 25? What if the truth was that Duran was better than me? What would happen then? I shared these thoughts with no one. I couldn’t afford for them to get back to anybody in Duran’s camp. Still, the doubts were there. They always were. Which may be why I violated one of my most cherished rules about a week before the fight. I told Juanita, who was staying in a separate room, that I wanted to make love.

  “We can’t do that, Ray,” she pleaded. “You’ll need all your strength for Duran. We never have sex this close to a fight. You know that.”

  “Of course, I know,” I protested, “but it has been many weeks since we were together.”

  We went back and forth for a few more minutes before she gave in
. That night remains the only time before a big fight that I ever had sex within days of the opening bell.

  In New Orleans, members of my team did not bump into Duran and his people as often as we did in Montreal, but nobody was complaining. Whenever we did run into him, he was the same madman as before. It was as if the 7UP commercial had never taken place.

  There was one major difference: I was not rattled. I was ready.

  Finally, November 25 was here. I woke up feeling the exact opposite of how I felt on that dreary day in Montreal. My biorhythms were in perfect order. I could not wait for showtime.

  The next encouraging sign came at the morning weigh-in when I tipped the scales at 146 pounds on the nose. For the first fight, I weighed about a pound less and felt thin. Fans may wonder: What is the big deal about a pound or two? It can be a huge deal. The extra muscle tissue, in the upper body especially, would provide me with the armor I would need to absorb his attacks, not to mention the boost in confidence.

  Nothing, though, lifted my spirits as much as the rendition of “America the Beautiful” before the fight. Normally, I don’t pay attention during the national anthem or any other prefight rituals. I’m completely in the zone and have no desire to come out. This was an exception. It was the first and only time I met Ray Charles, my namesake.

  How his appearance was kept a secret from me, and who invited him, I have no idea. All I recall are the chills that came over my entire body as Mr. Charles, in a blue shirt and blue blazer and wearing his familiar sunglasses, sang with remarkable passion, as if any word might be his last. I bounced up and down and could not stop smiling. I stole a glance at Duran, who was not moved one bit. He seemed removed, as I had been in Montreal, perhaps wishing he were somewhere else. The scowl was gone. For once, he did not look like Charles Manson.

  You are now in America! I thought to myself. This was Team USA vs. Panama.