He was unbeaten in 36 fights before losing a split decision to Emile Griffith in a 1960 non-title fight. In 1963, Rodriguez and Griffith fought twice for the World Welterweight Championship. Rodriguez defeated Griffith by a unanimous decision to win the title, but Griffith regained it three months later with a split decision. Their fourth and final meeting came in 1964, with Griffith retaining the welterweight title with a split decision.
In November 1969, Rodriguez challenged Nino Benvenuti in Rome, Italy, for the World Middleweight Championship. In the 11th round, slightly ahead on points but tiring and badly cut, Benvenuti suddenly landed a perfect left hook that left Rodriguez on the floor for 5 minutes.
El Feo, both a boxer and a puncher, was capable of accomplishing just about anything in the ring. But only aficionados and/or historians knew who he was as the slickster worked his ring magic under the radar for many years due to his short title reign and his crucial, albeit close, crossroads losses to Emille Griffith. He was cagey and cute and was unbeaten in 35 fights before losing a split decision to Griffith in 1960. In 1963, the two fought twice for the world welterweight championship. Rodriguez defeated Griffith by a unanimous decision to win the title. Unfortunately the win was overshadowed by the fateful Sugar Ramos-Davey Moore fight on the same card, but Griffith regained it three months later with a hotly disputed split decision. Their fourth and final meeting came in 1964, with Griffith retaining the welterweight title with still another split decision. Each fight was won by a razor thin margin. Many thought El Feo had been jobbed at least twice. Livid Cuban fans shouted at the Garden, “Ees terrible! Ees steenk! Ees no free countree!”.
Along other lines, Luis was very fond of a young and impressionable Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay) and vice versa. He was so stylish that Ali reportedly incorporated many of El Feo’s moves into his own repertoire when they both trained at Miami’s 5th Street Gym by the great Angelo Dundee. Both used blazing flurries and could inflict damage on their opponents while back peddling. Both possessed great jabs. Luis had long arms that gave him a reach advantage which he leveraged (along with cat-like quickness and great timing) to launch his snake-like long, left jab. He was flashy, but less so than The Kid.
“Rodriguez is a clown, a friendly clown. He has the furrowed forehead of a bloodhound and the nose of Cyrano. ‘Cyrano and I,’ he says, ‘have more in common than our noses. We are both poets.’… He likes to sing, play the piano and dance. At his training camp, Tamarack Lodge up in the Catskills, he appeared in the nightclub where his act included ‘an old song from my country,’ Bei Mir Bist du Schoen, in Yiddish.”—Robert H.
While relegated to relative obscurity, El Feo along with Gavilan and Jose “Mantequilla” Napoles are clearly the best of the great Cuban boxers. Each is in the International Boxing Hall of Fame as is Sugar Ramos and Kid Chocolate, and Legra could well be inducted someday as his final boxing record was 134-12-4.
Reference
In Search of Cuban Flash. (2014). Retrieved on April 27, 2014, from http://www.boxing.com/in_search_of_cuban_flash.html.
Luis Manuel Rodríguez. (2014). Retrieved on April 27, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Manuel_Rodr%C3%ADguez.
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