That Time When “Hands of Stone” Was Crushed: the 40-year anniversary of Hearns vs. Duran

Forty years ago today (June 15), Thomas Hearns scored one of the most stunning and destructive knockouts in boxing history at the expense of fellow legend Roberto Duran. Former Ring Magazine Editor-In-Chief and hall of famer Nigel Collins was there. This article is included in the current issue of The Ring, which can be read here or via the new app. 

 

IT’S BACK TO 1984 LAS VEGAS FOR A RINGSIDE VIEW OF THOMAS HEARNS VS. ROBERTO DURAN

From a certain angle, the Caesars Palace outdoor arena looked like the skeleton of an abandoned amusement park. In a few hours, it would come alive with the din of the mob; Thomas “Hitman” Hearns and Roberto “Manos de Piedra” Duran were scheduled to do nasty things to each other. Who wouldn’t want to see that?

It was June 15, 1984, and I had recently joined The Ring’s staff after more than a decade as a freelancer and was eager to see if my new status would reward me with a good seat, so I walked out of the media center and into Nevada’s unrelenting summer oven. I moseyed down to ringside, a ritual that can bring a rush of prefight nirvana or a case of sightline blues. Usually, it is somewhere in between. My spot turned out to be better-than-average, three rows from the ring.

I don’t know why, but boxing seems to have some sort of rhythm that controls its fate. It’s random but has been going on since the beginning. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad, but occasionally it’s fantastic. The 1980s was such a time. It started with an influx of terrific boxers who propelled a resurgence that neither the media nor the fans could ignore. It was not exactly a matter of the right place at the right time, more like the right fighters at the right time.

Most of the ’80s were before the digital revolution sucked the lifeblood out of print publications, a time when there were free fights on TV virtually every week. By “free” I mean you didn’t even need cable. I’m sure there are a fair number of four-belt-era acolytes who are weary of reading the same old stories about what boxing used to be. I’m weary of writing about it. But, come on. The ’80s weren’t that long ago. Did I mention that back then, the matches fans most wanted to see were generally made with what now seems like warp speed?

It was also a decade when some of the 20th century’s most celebrated fighters did their most memorable work. None more so than the quartet of Ray Leonard, Marvin Hagler, Hearns and Duran. It wasn’t just the die-hards. The public knew their names, even if they couldn’t pick their faces out of a line-up. Today they are collectively known as “The Four Kings” – a good name for George Kimball’s book, but the term has been grossly overused and is now a cliché.

 

DURAN

How boxers spend their time outside the ring is just as important as what they do inside. We all know that. Right? There is no separation. Mind and body are one, but not always equal. We are all a little crazy, but boxers more so. Duran was clearly the wildest of the four, a mercurial live wire with fists of stone. Nobody questioned whether it’s true he knocked out a horse or a lion, maybe both. Then there’s the yarn about stealing an airplane for a joy ride and crash-landing in the sea around Panama. Maybe they’re all true. If so, Duran would be the right guy for the job.

Duran was a splendid boxer; young or old, in shape or out of shape, he knew exactly what he was doing in the ring. He was wolf-like during a bout, savvy and savage, his disdain for his opponents obvious. Roberto wallowed in his celebrity status. He fronted a salsa band, attracted as many women as he wanted. And as 19th century sportswriter Pierce Egan famously said of bareknuckle champion Henry “The Game Chicken” Pearce, Duran “poured down copious libations at the shrine of Bacchus.”

Duran could have been inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame (IBHOF) on the strength of his lightweight achievements. He was at his very best at lightweight and is arguably the greatest 135-pounder ever. The move to junior welterweight was necessitated by body and soul. Duran was a welterweight by the time he fought Leonard the first time, June 20, 1980. It was a highly competitive fight in which the Panamanian won a unanimous 15-round decision in front of 46,317 delirious fans at Montreal’s Olympic Stadium. There was no controversy; Duran deserved to win.   

“El Cholo’s” finest moment was quickly followed by his worst, the shameful “No Mas” loss in the Leonard rematch. Regardless of the reason he quit, and there are plenty of them, it is an indelible stain on a fantastic career. Some observers never quite thought of him the same way as before. He was boxing’s Benedict Arnold for a short while, but less than a year later, Duran was back.

A cult of personality born in Panama spread through the Caribbean to the United States and helped Duran stay afloat. He could always attract a crowd because he was Duran and still a superb fighter. Inconsistency and lifestyle were problems, but nobody could stop a man like him from doing whatever he wanted to do.

When Duran lost a 10-round decision to Kirkland Laing, the result was so flabbergasting that it was The Ring’s Upset of the Year for 1982. What the hell was going on with Manos de Piedra?

My guess is obvious: He was haunted by the disgraceful loss to Leonard. Did their second fight change him? Did he feel guilt or shame? Did he party harder than before to hide his pain? Was Mr. Macho hiding behind a curtain like the Wizard of Oz? Only Duran knows for sure.

When somebody offered him a quarter of a million dollars to fight Hagler, Duran eagerly accepted. Did he train for Hagler? Not even Duran could have gone 15 rounds with Marvin without training. Duran wasn’t stupid. He just had bad habits. 

Rather than the expected firefight between heavy hitters, Hagler-Duran was a cerebral boxing match, pitting two masters of the art. Duran outdid himself in the ring, but it wasn’t quite good enough to defeat Marvelous Marvin, who won the final two rounds to prevail via unanimous decision. Despite his loss to Hagler, Duran’s surprising performance and enduring popularity kept him near the top echelon of bankable boxers. His fanatics, and there were a lot of them, believed he beat Hagler. But it’s doubtful many of them would say it to Marvin’s face. Duran, of course, has been bitching ever since the decision was announced. 

 

HEARNS

“Thomas Hearns looked like a fighter built by committee,” wrote historian Bert Sugar. “From the wrists to shoulders, the committee dictated he be heavily muscled, possessing the physical build of a wide receiver, and, with a 78-inch wingspan, the look of a basketball center.”

His straight right was Hearns’s money punch, but the left hook, especially to the body, also did a lot of damage. His height of 6-foot-1 was unreal for a junior middleweight. He was giraffe-like, tall, heavy on top with skinny legs. Hall of Fame trainer/manager Emanuel Steward taught Tommy well, especially in how to use his physical advantages.

Hearns put some distance between himself and his lone defeat (a 14th-round stoppage to Leonard in the 1981 Fight of the Year) by winning six fights in a row. The most significant was a 15-round majority decision over Wilfred Benitez to annex the WBC junior middleweight title. However, only two of the six bouts were via knockouts. There were many jump-the-gun observers who felt Hearns had lost his killer instinct. His opponents were not crashing to the canvas with the same frequency that highlighted Tommy’s climb to the WBA welterweight title. Was “The Hitman” running out of bullets?

Hearns explained that the decrease in knockouts was due to hand injuries, an occupational hazard for boxers. But when he signed to fight Duran, Hearns assured everyone his hands were good to go. Steward was just as confident. “[Duran] doesn’t do well against tall fighters,” said Steward. “Tommy’s style is going to give him problems, especially with his height and hand speed.”

According to FBI stats, Hearns’s hometown of Detroit was the murder capital of the United States in the ’80s, which had caused him to question his “Hitman” nickname. He decided to switch to something a little less lethal and rebranded himself “The Motor City Cobra.” For the Duran fight, however, Tommy proclaimed “The Hitman is back and Duran will fall in two.”

 

THE FIGHT

Duran looked like a guy they found in an alley sleeping off a bender. His face was puffy, his beard unkempt, his body language that of a man who needed money and was willing to get his ass kicked to get it. Roberto knew it was not going to end well for him. Don’t let anybody tell you different. The Duran who held Hagler close on the cards was gone. He’d fallen into too many beds and too many bottles.

Duran made a few tentative probes. Hearns was all muscle and fast on his feet. His long left jab did not even have to land to keep Duran at a distance. Then the jabs began to connect, and the right hands and left hooks soon followed. Duran avoided some, but most found the target. Tommy’s right slammed into Roberto’s head and put him on the canvas. He beat referee Carlos Padilla’s count, but maybe it would have been better if he’d stayed on the floor.

Hearns punished him along the ropes, where Roberto sat on the bottom strand to avoid the onslaught, sticking his butt in the face of the ringside grandees. A left hook to the body dropped Duran for the second time in the first round. He rose again and the bell rang. Roberto didn’t know where he was and wandered to a neutral corner. It was just a matter of time.

It appeared that Duran wanted to get it over with one way or another in the second round. He managed to land a few punches, but they didn’t faze “The Hitman.” Around the one minute mark, Hearns landed another blockbuster right that put Duran down on his face. Referee Padilla didn’t bother to count, because Duran’s corner crew swarmed the ring, anxious to help their fallen fighter.

The best post-fight quote was Duran’s: “When I hit the canvas in the middle of the first round, what came to my mind was those two lesbians in Miami.”

 

AFTERMATH

Duran fought 36 more times after Hearns knocked him out. Along the way, Duran took the WBC middleweight title from Iran Barkley by 12-round split decision. It was a sensational fight and The Ring’s 1989 Fight of the Year.  His final bout was a 10-round decision loss to Hector Camacho, July 14, 2001. He might still be fighting today if he hadn’t been badly injured in a car accident in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He officially retired in January 2002 at the age of 50, saying, “I can’t return to fight because [recovering from my injuries] is going to take a long time.” He was inducted into the IBHOF in 2007.

It’s quite remarkable how Duran morphed from snarling badass to everybody’s friend in retirement. It took time. In 2010, I saw him in Los Angeles at the Tecate Premios Deportes awards. He had put on a lot of weight and seemed grouchy. The next time I saw him was at the 2019 Atlantic City Boxing Hall of Fame weekend. He had slimmed down considerably and was super friendly, posing for photos with the fans, hugging and kissing old friends on the cheek, seemingly delighted with all the attention.

Hearns had 27 more fights after demolishing Duran. Two fights later, it was Tommy’s turn to get creamed, when Hagler furiously knocked him out in the third round. Despite the bout going less than three rounds, it was so barbarous that it was selected as The Ring’s 1985 Fight of the Year.

Hearns knocked out Dennis Andries to annex the vacant WBC light heavyweight title March 7, 1987, and then won the vacant WBC middleweight belt by knocking out Juan Roldan on October 29 of the same year. “The Hitman” also took the WBA light heavyweight title away from Virgil Hill, June 3, 1991. He retired in 2006 and remains one of the most popular fighters of his era.

Read “The Day ‘The Hitman’ was Born” in the October 2020 issue of The Ring.

 

ROOKIE MISTAKE

From the start of my career, I’ve always strived to be in my seat for the first fight. When asked why, I used to say, “What if a boxer dies and I have to tell my editor I was having a drink at the bar?” I’ve changed that to “What if something unusual happens?” but still usually arrive in time to see the first preliminary. There are sensible exceptions, but I was blithely unaware of one of them.

There was no one around except the busy TV bees putting the finishing touches to the stage that would showcase Hearns vs. Duran. The media section was deserted, so I opened my notebook and waited for the show to begin. Soon, two boxers jogged down to the ring. It was the first of nine prelims, an extravaganza  of alphabet titleholders: heavyweight Tony Tucker, lightweight Jimmy Paul, junior middleweight Duane Thomas, lightweight Arturo Frias, junior lightweight Louis Espinoza – and four other guys.

All the house fighters won, but Paul’s sixth-round knockout of previously undefeated Alvin “Too Sweet” Hayes was the most memorable. Hayes was a flashy showboat and wore sunglasses into the ring, something you hardly ever saw back in the 1980s. If I remember correctly, “Too Sweet” wore pink trunks and a matching robe.

After watching around four bouts, I began to feel the effects of the Nevada sun beating down on my hatless head. My face and arms were tinged red and I started to sweat, which was probably a good thing. Covering the fights diverted my attention from my overheated body and by the last few prelims, my vision was playing tricks and I felt mildly woozy.

Around the same time, the media came drifting in. Then I realized where they had been: in the air-conditioned media center watching the fights on TV. What a monumental rookie mistake! I survived the ordeal, thanks to a bottle of water another writer gave me. As the Earth spun and the sun slowly began to go down, Hearns and Duran made their ring walks. It was still 90 degrees. 

– – Nigel Collins

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