I Am Duran

by Roberto Duran

  Even the Americans knew their idol had been beaten badly. “It was, from almost the opening salvo, a fight that belonged to Durán,” wrote William Nack in Sports Illustrated.

  The Panamanian seized the evening and gave it what shape and momentum it had. He took control, attacking and driving Leonard against the ropes, bulling him back, hitting him with lefts and rights to the body as he maneuvered the champion against the ropes from corner to corner. Always moving forward, he mauled and wrestled Leonard, scoring inside with hooks and rights. For three rounds Durán drove at Sugar Ray with a fury, and there were moments when it seemed the fight could not last five. Unable to get away, unable to counter and unable to slide away to open up the ring, Leonard seemed almost helpless under the assault. Now and then he got loose and countered—left-right-left to Durán’s bobbing head—but he missed punches and could not work inside, could not jab, could not mount an offense to keep Durán at bay.

  “I admit, he intimidated me,” Leonard would say years later. “He knew exactly what to say; how to say it. He got to my head. I tell you he got to my head.”

  “Many people did not believe I could make it,” I told William Nack a few weeks after the fight, “but I did.

  Many people believed I was too old to win, but I was not. Many said I could not beat Sugar Ray Leonard. Before the fight I asked myself, ‘Why can’t I beat him?’ I wondered, ‘Maybe he’s a phantom and you can’t beat him.’ Maybe they thought I was going to stand in the ring and let him beat on me, like I had my hands tied. . . . That’s the only way he can beat me. I would have to be tied to a tree, with my hands behind my back . . . he would have to break me down a thousand times. He was strong, but he did not hurt me. My rage was very big. When I get into the ring to fight, I always give the best.

  As a promotion, the fight had done very well, even with nothing like the closed-circuit technology that’d be available today. It made a lot of money, setting a record back then for the highest-grossing fight of all time. It was also really the first-ever “superfight” between boxers in a lower weight division after a decade or more of boxing being all about the heavyweights. It was no longer about Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier and the other heavyweights, who got all the attention and all the money. Now it was going to be me, Leonard, Thomas Hearns, Aaron Pryor, Marvin Hagler, and Alexis Argüello getting what we deserved. And though people did talk about the others, mostly they talked about me, Durán. Now the whole world knew that El Cholo was champion of the world—they were comparing me to greats like Sugar Ray Robinson, Joe Louis, and Henry Armstrong. I’d never lost a title fight—one win as a welterweight, thirteen wins as a lightweight, with twelve knockouts. No one had ever beaten me for a title—I’d just had to give one of them up because I couldn’t make weight. Now I’d become only the third lightweight champion in boxing history to win both lightweight and welterweight titles. Henry Armstrong, Barney Ross—and Roberto Durán. That was it. This was the greatest victory of my career. I’d worked my ass off and now I was on top of the world and ready to party. But I wasn’t going to do it alone. I wanted people to share in my success, in the glory of Panama.

  For Leonard things were completely different. I’d crushed him, physically and emotionally, and he was ready to retire. He took his wife to Hawaii to get away from everything, but whenever he tried to go for a run along the beach he wouldn’t get a hundred yards without having people come up to say, “When are you going to fight Durán again?” and “What happened to you in that fight?” and “Ray, you could have won if you’d fought your fight.” Every day down on that beach he got madder and madder. By the fifth, he was asking his manager for a rematch, right now. Meanwhile, I was into my fifth day of partying. Cerveza, whiskey, women. There would be plenty more days of partying to come.

  FIVE

  NO MÁS

  ARÍSTIDES ROYO SÁNCHEZ may have been the president of Panama, but I was the king. Royo Sánchez wanted me back home right away so I could join in the celebrations that were already under way, and he sent a plane to get me. The streets of Panama had been empty hours before the fight—from around five o’clock, I was told—and of course when I beat Leonard everyone rushed out into the streets again, jumped in their cars, honked their horns. It was carnival time the length of the country. My friends and family celebrated all night. Walla, my lion, was the only one who wasn’t excited—he slept through the whole thing.

  But I had other plans: “No comas mierda, Durán—vamos a Nueva York,” said Victor del Corral. Don’t mess around, Durán—let’s go to New York. Royo Sánchez was insistent—he wanted my victory to make him look good. There was a colonel who was shitting his pants because I was refusing to go back with him on that plane. “I’m not going back to Panama without you,” he said. “No way am I going to lose my job because of you.”

  I didn’t give a shit about his problems. “Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t ask anyone to send a plane.”

  And so off we went to New York. I was no longer that kid who’d been terrified the plane was going to touch the skyscrapers. I knew my way around the city, and better still, the Latins loved me. Not just the Panamanians; the Cubans, too, the Puerto Ricans, the Mexicans. I’d beaten Leonard, and the Puerto Ricans loved that because Leonard was the guy who’d beaten the crap out of Wilfred Benítez in 1979.

  I was having a great time and so was Fula. She went to the Louis Vuitton store and they closed it for her so she could to do her shopping alone. She must have spent $50,000 on suitcases and clothes. She’s just like me—loves bling, stuff that sparkles. She still has all that Louis Vuitton stuff—the suitcases, the training bag, where I’d stick my passport, boxing gloves, and other gear.

  Victor had scheduled a big celebration at his restaurant for me that Saturday night. I went downstairs to the hotel bar to have a drink first and I could see there were hundreds of people outside. I had my drink, thinking how crazy all this was, and when Victor showed up he said, “You need to leave in a limousine.” We left by the back way to avoid all those people trying to get a piece of me.

  I got hammered that night. There was a big cake topped with the words DURÁN CHAMPION. I signed autographs for everyone even though my right hand was still taped up from the fight. I don’t think it had quite sunk in yet how big that victory was. Everywhere we went, for days afterward, people would come up to shake hands.

  On Monday, June 23, three days after the fight, I finally agreed to return to Panama with the colonel on the presidential plane. I’d been partying the whole time in New York, and now I was ready to go back to Panama and party some more. The president declared a national holiday in my honor—“Roberto Durán Day”—and nearly two million of my countrymen wanted to celebrate. “Yours is a triumph on a national scale,” he said, “and also a victory for the Panamanian people.” As the plane came in on its final approach, I looked down and could see the crowds, screaming and cheering. They knew I was coming home to celebrate.

  It soon became clear to my family what I meant to the people of Panama. They’d wanted to pick me up at the airport, but there were so many people on the streets there was no way through. The press estimated that as many as 200,000 people had gathered at the airport—as many as had celebrated the previous fall when the United States turned the Canal Zone over to Panama, if not more.

  The plane made one last loop over the Bay of Panama before landing. The sea of fans rushed the plane, and I came down the steps, pointing at the belt strapped around my waist. This didn’t belong to me, I told everyone: “It belongs to you—my people, the people I love, who supported me!” They went crazy!

  The crowds followed our limousine all the way along the parade route, which took us from the airport to a square outside the presidential palace. For some reason, there was no carnival queen that year, so they made me the king of the carnival. The float we were on was in the shape of a ring, and we were surrounded by other Panamanian fighters and former champions like Alfonso
Frazer and Ernesto Marcel as if they were my court.

  It felt like the party went on for weeks. Everybody loved me, but I’d also come to realize by then that I had a lot of fair-weather friends, people who were only too happy to hang off me during the good times but would soon be gone once the party was over. But Victor del Corral was not one of them, and though Panama was my homeland, I felt most at home in New York with Victor in his restaurant, eating a steak he’d cut himself—there was even a steak named after me on the menu. So I decided to leave Panama again and head straight for Victor’s Café.

  It was now a month after the fight, and we went out drinking, dining, and partying with a lot of people. I hung out with my lowlife friends, who never had any money, as well as the millionaires. Night after night, we partied until everything was just one big haze. I got to the point where I weighed nearly 200 pounds! But I didn’t care—there weren’t any more fights to worry about.

  Back in Panama again, I needed a break from it all, but there were people actually lining up to get into my house, cars jamming all the streets in the neighborhood, and I didn’t mind celebrating with them. It wasn’t just one party, it was parties every night, and as many as two hundred, three hundred people in my house. I’d give away money to anyone who asked—as much as $5,000 in an hour.

  Eleta seemed to have anticipated all this: he knew from experience that insanity would follow. I was surrounded by witches, he told me. I’d lost control, and things were now moving against me. Nowadays, I can understand what he was talking about.

  I’ve had a lot of manzanillos in my life. That’s Panamanian slang for people who leech off the rich and famous. The Americans call it an entourage; back then, I called them my friends. It was hard for me to say no to them, because sometimes there were as many as five or six in my camp, sometimes more. I can’t recall all their names, but I do remember guys like Ramos and Giovanni who liked to hang with me. Then there were good friends, like Wiwa and Chaparro, and my brothers, especially Pototo—I could never say no to them.

  I knew Wiwa and Chaparro from the old days, when we were growing up in El Chorrillo. In the early days, Wiwa was selling lottery tickets there, but as I became famous I started taking him everywhere, especially the United States, because he was always a good guy to have around. When you’re a long way from home, it’s nice to have family around you to remind you where you’ve come from. Wiwa went to all my fights, he’d cook for me, and we’d go running together, along with Pototo. In the evenings, after training, we all liked to play dominoes and listen to salsa music. One guy carried my gym bag, another carried my boom box. There was a guy who did my laundry and one who handled security. There was a guy to play dominoes with me and another guy to cook. Yet another guy was there to dry me off. Sometimes they’d fight among themselves to see who could get closest to me, and all the time it was, “Get this for me” or “Give me a hundred dollars.” “Okay,” I’d say—but then one of them would disappear, or try to steal my car, and I’d have to find yet another manzanillo to get it back for me.

  Of course I gave all of them money and paid for their food and hotel rooms. I didn’t ask a lot of questions, even though I knew they were only along for the ride. I needed them, too, in lots of ways—when I was away, they were the only people I could have a conversation with in my own language, apart from Victor. I guess people might expect me, a pelao from the streets, to have been a bit more streetwise. But I didn’t see it that way. I had money, they were my friends, and I was glad to help them.

  Maybe I do trust people too much. I always see good intentions, never bad ones. But here’s the truth: we had a great time! It wasn’t just the manzanillos around for the fights—it was everyone from my neighborhood in El Cangrejo. Everyone from El Chorrillo—everyone in Panama! My house was full all the time—full to bursting—and occasionally we’d have to put security at the front door to stop any more from coming in.

  People were now lining up at my door asking for money—money for rent, college, hospital bills, money to clothe their kids and buy them toys. And I gave it to them—I probably got rid of tens of thousands of dollars like that—maybe as much as $10,000 in a single day. Anything to help poor people, anything to help the people of Panama. Fula told me to stop, because if I ran out of money, there’d be nothing for my family, but I couldn’t. I’ve always been like that—if I have money, then I’m happy to give it away. If I don’t, well, I’ll find a way to get some. I’m not a philosopher, but I believe that if you’re a kind person and love others, the world will love you back. But if you’re an asshole, you’ll be an asshole all your life and people will only hate you. And when you die, the only people who’ll show up at your funeral will be your family. I was in love with Panama, and Panama was in love with me. I was Panama’s hero, and I was happy to play that role. Why not? I deserved it. El Cholo was el campeón del mundo, and I was going to enjoy every fucking minute.

  That’s what I thought, anyway, until in September, when I was back in New York, partying, and I got a call from Eleta. “Cholo, we need you in Panama, because we’ve signed the rematch.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon.”

  “No, you’ve got to come now—you’ve got a month to get ready. We’ve signed for a rematch with Leonard for the WBC welterweight title.”

  “Are you fucking crazy? I weigh nearly 200 pounds! I can’t drop all that weight in a month!”

  Leonard and his manager, Mike Trainer, had been desperate to get me back in the ring, and Eleta and Don King didn’t have a problem putting me in an impossible position—they had no idea how much of a good time I’d been having. King was in control now; he’d made it a condition of the rematch that Bob Arum wouldn’t be involved, because I was the champion now and he wasn’t my promoter. Eleta told me he’d asked King to postpone the fight, but King said no way, there was too much money riding on it. I was guaranteed to make $8 million—but only if I fought Leonard in New Orleans in November.

  It was news to me that Leonard was even going to fight again. The last I’d heard he’d gone off to Hawaii, talking about retiring. I certainly didn’t think I’d be fighting him again, let alone so soon after the first fight. At the very least, I thought I’d have some time to get in shape. There’d been talk of a fight between me and the winner of a Thomas Hearns–Pipino Cuevas match, but that hadn’t happened. It would have made a lot more sense for me to have had one fight before I faced Leonard again—a ten-round, non-title fight—but that wasn’t going to happen, because everyone wanted to get rich quick.

  As soon as I got the call from Eleta, we left New York. But—big mistake—back in Panama I kept partying. Eleta found a doctor to inject me with diuretics to help me lose weight. That wasn’t much help—in fact, it drained me and made me weaker, which made the training even harder.

  I have never felt as bad as I did then. It was horrendous—all the self-discipline that I’d maintained deserted me after I beat Leonard. I’ve got two world titles, I said to myself. I’ve got money, I’ve got fame—I just want to relax. It happens to all athletes. You can be great for five, six, seven, ten years—and then you fall. A boxer is no exception, and for a Latin boxer, it’s even worse: we love to eat and drink and have a good time. But training is nothing but hard work, all the time: constant discipline.

  People don’t understand what it takes to become a champion in boxing. You have to bust your ass every day, every week, for months on end—and then get up the next morning and do it all over again. You know what it’s like to train for two or three months? You go crazy! It’s the most difficult thing you can ever do. So I’d busted my ass training; now it was time to go to the disco, empezar la jodienda, coño!—start fucking around. I deserved it! And after the Leonard fight, that became the norm for me.

  Meanwhile, Leonard wanted revenge. He’d heard about my weight and all the partying, so he wanted to get me in the ring as soon as possible. He went and found new spa
rring partners: nasty fighters. And unlike me, he cut back on his manzanillos, which he admitted had been a major distraction with the first fight. He’d had thirty people, maybe more, on a per diem and still complaining, all kinds of petty shit. Word would get back to him that one guy hadn’t paid his bill. Another was selling T-shirts at the hotel even though they’d been given the rooms free. It was insulting.

  But I wasn’t doing the same thing with my manzanillos. I wanted things to be just like they were for the first fight. “This time, I will kill him,” I told reporters. I called Leonard a clown. When I saw him, I shot him my middle finger, just like old times. “To beat me,” I said, “you have to come and fight me. He goes into the ring and tries to imitate Ali, but an imitator is a loser.” But it was clear that Leonard wasn’t going to let me intimidate him anymore. He was playing his own mind games. He was becoming more of a jerk—more like me.

  There was a brief moment of truce. Early on, 7UP had the idea of putting us and our sons in a commercial together. Chavo and Ray Junior hugged each other, each holding a can of 7UP, while we faced off in the gym in street clothes. Then the kids offered each of us a can of 7UP and we looked down at them and smiled.

  Leonard was nervous, thinking that I was going to do something crazy. If I acted up, he told them, he was walking away. But I love children—I hugged his son and kissed him. It was a rare moment of kindness between us, and it would be the last for a very long time.

  I knew it was going to be a tough fight because of my conditioning. To lose fifty pounds in just a month! Puta! A baby could have punched me and it would have felt like a heavyweight, that’s how drained I was. I would leave training drained. I felt rotten from the day I started training again, and it stayed that way right up to the day of the fight. A few days before the fight, I saw Leonard running outside the Superdome and I told Plomo, “This guy is going to get away from me.”