i think hagler was favored, by how much, i dont know.
a rematch never happend cuz hagler retired two years later and hearns moved up in weight.
hearns' mentality was to get rid of hagler early, this was haglers idea, also. i dont think it wouldve been any different if hearns boxed instead of brawled.
The vibes I was getting was that Hearns was favoured to beat him. People were interested to see whether Hearns could be the guy to knock Hagler out, but were expecting Hearns to out-jab him and go for points. I was only young at the time, but I remember that Hearns was favoured to win. He was coming up in weight and was going to be too fast and rangey, with Marvin on the slide. Those were the vibes I was getting.
I think Hearns was the favourite....
just based on his knockout against Roberto Duran, alot of people thought he'd do the same to Hagler.
Hagler almost lost against Duran too.
another reason some people may have favored hearns was the fact that he was socializing at casinos days before the fight, doing public workouts,talking with people, playing blackjack, he seemed very sure of himself. I wonder how the fight would've gone if he hadn't gotten that leg massage pre fight.
according to manny steward (if i remember the interview which I read in a book about the greatest fights ever):
hearns' plan was outboxing hagler. But he felt his legs weakened (steward claims this was direct consequence of a massage) and had to slug it out. In round he apparently broke his right hand and could not use in the fllowing rounds.
that's the story, steward also reports that hearns did not want him to tell this to the press (at the time) because he felt hagler earned his victory.
my comment:
long live to marvelous
long live to the hitman
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