NEW YORK – The most famous of their three fights happened during the waning days of the Carter administration, but Sugar Ray Leonard says that 33 years later, people routinely inquire about his November 1980 rematch with Roberto Duran in New Orleans.

“I’m asked around the world about No Mas always,” Leonard, 57, told the audience last week at a New York screening of No Mas, the latest installment in ESPN Films’ “30 for 30” series. “A day doesn’t go by that I’m not asked about the No Mas fight.”

The bout, which ended with Duran, now 62, withdrawing in the eighth round and sullied an otherwise excellent career, is best known as the “No mas” (meaning ‘no more’ in English) fight since that is was the Panamanian fighter reportedly said to referee Octavio Meyran before quitting. In the film, which debuts Tuesday on ESPN, and later in person, Duran vows that he never actually uttered those words.

“From his mouth, he never actually said ‘no mas.’ The actual words ‘no mas,” Duran’s son Robin, who served as his translator on the screening panel, said. “He waved his hands and the referee said it. [This film is the] first time he sees the referee saying that, he actually thought it was Ray Arcel (one of Duran’s trainers) who said no mas.”

“It’s very hard for a fighter to speak with a mouthpiece on. He just waved his hand and this [is the] first time he sees the referee saying that he said no mas.”

Regardless who uttered the legendary phrase, it was Duran’s motivation to quit the fight and the mental toll that decision had taken on both him and Leonard through the years that led filmmaker Eric Drath to pursue the project. Drath proposed to Leonard that they fly to Duran’s native Panama for a filmed conversation between the two fighters.

Drath manages to tell an amazing story through just the footage alone, as the first half of the film relies heavily on archival clips of both their first fight in Montreal in June 1980 (which Duran won), the rematch and the logistics that went into there being just a five-month gap between the two.

Leonard (and the filmmaker) seemed to be searching for a bigger explanation for Duran’s actions during the fight, one other than his three decade claim that he withdrew due to stomach cramps. It would certainly make for a larger impact had Duran finally wavered from that excuse, especially as the pair’s conversation in Panama is set up with them standing opposite each other in a boxing ring, squaring off for what promises to be one final confrontation.

Duran, who had ballooned in weight after the first bout due to weeks of partying, has blamed his stomach issues on his struggle to rapidly shed excess baggage before the weigh-in. If Leonard and Drath were looking for him to admit to a fix or some other nefarious occurrence, it wasn’t happening. The film leaves a sense that Leonard didn’t exactly leave Panama with the answers he was looking for, despite him saying otherwise on camera. After viewing the movie for the first time at the New York screening, he vowed that he was satisfied with the outcome.

“I would accept that as 100 percent closure,” Leonard said. “The man is saying what he honestly feels is the truth and I take it for what it’s worth. Did it bother me? Yes, it bothered me for awhile, for a number of years I should say. Put it this way, when I finally surrendered and said that I was an alcoholic, my life is better. We all have to surrender at some point to make things better. So I do accept what he said.”

“What was shown on that screen was the truth, as far as I’m concerned. Roberto, I hated the son of a bitch back in the day but I love you now.”