Hands of Stone - Christian Giudice [133]
Something early on told Duran that this wasn’t going to be as difficult as everyone thought. “Many people felt I had nothing left to give,” said Duran. “People always think in what they see but people don’t think in what I have in here [his heart]. When I saw Davey Moore fight, I said, ‘This isn’t shit. I’m going to make him eat that shit.’”
Duran set up training camp at Great Gorge in McAfee, New Jersey, and then moved to Gleason’s Gym. A couple days before the bout, Duran found his opponent preparing for morning roadwork in New York and leapt at the chance to intimidate him. “One day I’m finishing running at the park and Moore was about to start running,” said Duran. “I keep staring at him. He tried to impress me with his body. I laugh in his face. I tell Plomo after this guy passed by that I’m going to beat the shit out of him. He looks back and I look back at him and laugh at him. I tell Plomo I’m going to rip him apart.”
With the weigh-in at 11 a.m. on the day of the fight, Spada checked Duran’s weight at 8 a.m and he was easily under the 154-pound limit. However, Moore wasn’t in the same shape. “The day of the weigh-in this guy couldn’t make weight,” said Duran. “I told everyone, you go send out for my dinner and what not, but I’m not moving until he makes weight. I stood there and he’s watching me eat in front of him.”
Spada recalled the scene: “The people of Davey Moore made a big mistake because they believed that Duran was too old and Moore was a good, young champion. Moore came in overweight at 156 pounds and Roberto made 152. After making weight Roberto went to eat, he loves that. Moore had two hours to make weight. I stayed with them until they made the weight.”
The weigh-in also gave the first inkling of the extraordinary support Duran would call on that night. “It was the most amazing thing in the world,” said boxing editor Bert Sugar. “I’m at the weigh-in and they have flags. If you placed a call to Panama that night, no one would have answered: They were all in NY.” Even Carlos Eleta would show up. “We went in the dressing room,” said Duran. “A godfather of mine comes in and tells me he has a message from Eleta. ‘What does he want?’ I ask. ‘He wants to come to the fight and be in your corner.’ I tell him that I don’t want him to come to the fight or be in my corner or anything.”
It seemed like an odd time for Eleta to try to get back into Duran’s life. “My godfather Tito Iglesias said, ‘We respect him but we don’t want him here.’ Spada started crying and I ask him what’s wrong,” said Duran. “I tell him I don’t want Eleta here and a bunch of things. I get my godfather and I tell him that I don’t even want to see Eleta here in a can of paint. Tell him to look through the TV and I’m going to be champ. And when I go back to Panama, I tell him not even to say hello to me. I told him that that night I would become a champion again. And I did.” Eleta disputes that such a conversation ever occurred.
No matter how physically gifted and perfectly sculpted, Davey Moore was a youth compared to Duran. The Arum-promoted fighter turned twenty-four just a week before the bout. He had started boxing not long after leaving high school and as an amateur won four Golden Gloves titles and compiled a record of 96-6-4. He had won the world title in only his ninth bout and had defended it three times.
Although Clara Samaniego believed in the power of sorcerers and witches and would blame them for cursing her son when he lost, Duran claimed to be a Catholic who put his faith in the saints Virgin del Carmen and Saint Lazarus. However, he also believed in a Babalu aye, a santeria (the Afro-Cuban faith with roots in the Yoruba region of Nigeria) god of health and healing who concerns himself with the poor. Identified with St Lazarus, Babalu is also the wrath of the earth and will punish those that disrespect it. Duran would call upon these mystical sources for strength against Moore.
The brash young fighter referred to Duran as over the hill, and predicted a first-round knockout