Mccallum on the legends hagler hearns leonard duran all ducked me

[Suckmedry]

McCallum has some of the best technique I've ever seen. It would have been great to watch him vs the fab four.

[therealpugilist]

McCallum has some of the best technique I've ever seen. It would have been great to watch him vs the fab four.

Indeed

[Reloaded]

I like McCallum and even seen him fight once and sat down to dinner with him once(same table anyways). But, Hagler did not duck McCallum. By time Hagler was retired McCallum was still unknown. Check the time line.
McCallum may have wanted a payday but so did Buster Drayton and Duane Thomas, the other light middleweight champions that shared the title with McCallum.

Benitez would have loved to fight Hagler too and might of if he didn't get beat by Hamsho.

He was known a lot more than Mugabi who was unknown at the time , not saying ducking , saying McCallum was a very dangerous guy very high risk no reward , Mike could really box , Mugabi was swing a for the fences type fighter , Mike was capable of beating Hagler way more than Mugabi was ,

Mike McCallum was a very good fighter that sat in the shadows .

[-Kev-]

I wasn't from that era, and wasn't reading newspaper articles about what was going on. But I am going to ahead an guess that it was because of money. That's why SRL didn't fight Pryor or McCallum, because the big money fighters were just interested in fighting each other. It's the same today, only that fans pretend it didn't happen back then.

[TBear]

He was known a lot more than Mugabi who was unknown at the time , not saying ducking , saying McCallum was a very dangerous guy very high risk no reward , Mike could really box , Mugabi was swing a for the fences type fighter , Mike was capable of beating Hagler way more than Mugabi was ,

Mike McCallum was a very good fighter that sat in the shadows .

No Mugabi was not unknown, he fought regularly on national television coming up. He stopped all of his first 18 opponents in front of thousands of viewers. By the time Mugabi fought Hagler, McCallum did have two defenses of his light middleweight but he was not regarded as high as would be a couple years later. His biggest wins were Luigi Minchillo and a faded Kalule.

[SlySlickSmooth]

Why didn't Duran and McCallum unify at Middleweight for the WBC/WBA?

[Reloaded]

No Mugabi was not unknown, he fought regularly on national television coming up. He stopped all of his first 18 opponents in front of thousands of viewers. By the time Mugabi fought Hagler, McCallum did have two defenses of his light middleweight but he was not regarded as high as would be a couple years later. His biggest wins were Luigi Minchillo and a faded Kalule.

You are talking out your ass , name one top fighter he beat before he fought Marvin , just one go on ?

I will make it easy for you he fought nobody pick one .

[K-DOGG]

I have to chime i n on this Mugabi/McCallum thin. I was 15 when Hagler defeated Mugabi and I had never heard of Mike McCallum at that time. I had, however, heard of John "The Beast" Mugabi.

What does that mean? It means Mugabi had more exposure. It does not mean that he was any better or mode deserving than "The Body Snatcher". More exposure, especially in the case of a fighter who has beaten all of his opponents by knockout, comes from an "exotic" country like Uganda, and who wears some jaguar-skin Tarzan outfit into the ring create a buzz. Everybody knew who Hagler was and how tough he was for he had destroyed Thomas "The Hitman" Yearns. Can you imagine........?

Its not fair; but it's business. Everybody wanted to see Hagler face the Beast from Uganda and would pay to see it. Meanwhile, only hard core boxing fans even knew who Mike McCallum was at that time. Mugabi was better hyped than most pro wrestlers. That's why it happened the way it did.

[Emon723]

The fab four do had one missed fights:

Hagler-Graham
Hearns-McCallum
Leonard-Nunn
Duran-Benn

[TBear]

You are talking out your ass , name one top fighter he beat before he fought Marvin , just one go on ?

I will make it easy for you he fought nobody pick one .

For starters Reloaded, I do not talk out my ass.

Furthermore I was there. Not only did I subscribe to every magazine for years previous to this time period but I also watched every bout of the era that was aired. Several of Mugabi victims were ranked. Fletcher was the number one middleweight contender when he lost a decision to Scypion and was still in the top ten when Mugabi knocked him out. James "Hard Rock" Green was a top ten light middleweight contender as was Hargrove. Parker was a middleweight fringe contender and Gazo though unranked was a former champion.

It is easy using "Hindsight" pointing out that McCallum had a better career but at the time he was no more deserving and was not nearly as marketable. Mugabi during his unbeaten ko streak made the cover of Ring Magazine and as I previously tried to explain, was a well known TV fighter.
It was years later that McCallum made he biggest mark by beating Curry and McCrory(I was ringside) This is not about who was the greater fighter but who at the time was the most marketable and presented the better challenge on paper.