Hands of Stone - Christian Giudice [83]
“He hit Dinamita so strongly that one felt sorry for him. Even his father came up to the ring, trying to stop the fight. I told him to go away, but since he refused I kicked him and hurt his eyebrow. They claimed it was Duran who had hit him, and put him to trial. In the end, he was made to pay thirty thousand dollars, despite the fact that I had been the one who had injured him. I always take good care of my boxers. If anyone wants to start a problem with one of them, I am ready to defend him.”
Promoter Don Chargin had walked into the gym moments after the incident. “They had known each other before and there was a problem with the workouts and there was an argument in the gym. You know how everybody, when they boxed with Duran, would try to work a little harder because he was a mean guy. Even in the gym he was like that. One thing led to another and I think they threw a couple punches after that. His father came up to the ring too, but it wasn’t anything real bad,” said Chargin.
Though promoting the fight as the “Combat Zone,” Don King was not pleased at Duran’s involvement in the unscripted spat. “He could have been injured seriously,” King told Sports Illustrated. “What else can happen before this fight? It was a job just to get the managers of the fighters to even think about a match. They had fought twice and neither wanted to fight a third time. First, I convinced DeJesus. But the hard part was convincing Eleta. Then, when we did agree, trying to find a site that pleased him was impossible. One place was too cold; the next was too hot. A third place, somewhere in Africa, was okay, but then Eleta didn’t think he could get Duran’s money out. He finally said yes to Las Vegas.”
The Los Angeles Herald-Examiner profiled Duran the week before the bout. The report would not have made pleasant reading for DeJesus and his camp:
A speed bag in the Main Street gym, shattered by the lightweight champion’s brutality, had to be replaced. So did a sparring partner for much the same reason.
Sylvester Stallone, the Oscar winner who is filming across the street, spends most every lunch break at 318½ So. Main. So do scores of others. Some bring cameras. They have been drawn to the gymnasium by a Panamanian prizefighter who took the nickname of Rocky because guys named Graziano and Marciano made it fashionable.
He is Roberto Duran, the WBA lightweight title holder of five and a half years, who exudes a sort of animalism like perhaps no other fighter. You get an insight into Duran’s feral ring style while watching him in the gym. He remains a destroyer because he works at it. Savagery is his business.
The reporter interviewed sparring partner Youngblood, who had been sent for because “he can’t hurt me”; Youngblood was two stones heavier than Duran. “The man is one of a kind,” he said. “If he sparred with anybody his own size in the gym, he would knock ’em dead. Duran is a nice person outside the ring. But when you work with him, it’s like working with an animal. I think one reason he’s so vicious in the ring is because he takes fighting so seriously. He’s not like any American fighter I’ve seen. His work is like a crusade.”
Duran clearly enjoyed his training sessions and played to the crowd, pummeling Youngblood, cursing and growling at the heavy bag, then punching the speed bag into a blur before battering it with his head – an exercise, he claimed, to strengthen his neck muscles. “He concludes his routine with rope jumping,” said the Examiner. “It, too, is accentuated by savage sounds. He has the rope going so swiftly at one point it seems he is only rocking