07/31/2021 13:00
Clarín.com
sports
Updated 07/31/2021 1:00 PM
Talent and conviction was the combination that
Teófilo Stevenson
had
to have been qualified as the greatest boxer seen in the amateur field
, comparable to what his contemporary Muhammad Ali did in professionalism, who nevertheless
decided to maintain his loyalty to Cuba and the revolution, causes for which he came to reject an offer of one million dollars
.
The proposal made to Stevenson implied, nothing less, than betraying the ideological roots of the Cuban regime: he had to defect from the island and settle in the
United States
to become a professional boxer.
Considered the best amateur boxer in history,
Stevenson reigned almost two decades at heavy weights
.
He won the Olympic titles in Munich 1972, Montreal 1976 and Moscow 1980, and could have disputed Los Angeles 1984, but Cuba did not attend for political reasons.
Teófilo Stevenson, the great amateur
Stevenson was born on March 29, 1952 in Central Delicias, Puerto Padre, Las Tunas province, Cuba
.
His parents were Teófilo Stevenson Parsons -an English-speaking immigrant born on the island of San Vicente who emigrated to Cuba in the 1920s to dedicate himself to cutting sugarcane- and Dolores Lawrence -a Cuban whose parents were also immigrants from the island of San Cristóbal. .
This is the reason why Stevenson was fluent in English.
Teófilo Stevenson when he defeated American Duane Bobick in the quarterfinals of the 1972 Munich Olympics.
Pirolo, as he was called, began boxing at age 14, having tried baseball without success
.
His first fight was in 1966, in a ring installed in the Julio Antonio Mella baseball stadium: he lost on points to Luis Enríquez, in the category up to 71 kilos.
Although he had won the national youth title in 1968 and had been national runner-up a year later, already in seniors and in the category up to 81 kilos
, Stevenson's destiny changed when he met Andrei Chervonenko
, who had arrived a few months before in Cuba and He traveled the country looking for fighters for the National Team.
The other fundamental man in the construction of the future monarch was Alcides Sagarra, head of the national team for more than three decades and
considered the father of the Cuban Boxing School for the innovations he introduced
.
Stevenson won three Olympic titles and three AIBA World Championship titles.
In Munich 1972
, and after knocking out the Polish Ludwik Denderys in the first round in his debut, Stevenson had to face in the quarterfinals the American Duane Bobick, a 22-year-old Navy officer, who had defeated him in the semifinals of the Pan American Games in Cali 1971 and who in his country nicknamed the White Hope.
Stevenson beat him up.
In the semi-final, he beat West German Peter Hussing.
In the decisive fight, Romanian Ion Alexe did not show up due to injury.
Without breaking a sweat, Stevenson achieved his first Olympic title
.
After Bobick's defeat, American boxing sought a symbolic rematch against Cuban sport:
Stevenson received a million-dollar offer to defect
, turn pro, and face then-world champion Joe Frazier.
I reject her.
"I will not leave my country for a million dollars or much more.
What is a million dollars compared to the love of eight million Cubans?
" He argued.
The Cuban knocked down Puerto Rican Narciso Maldonado in the final of the 1979 San Juan Pan American Games.
His decision deserved a special mention from
Fidel Castro
, with whom he would later build a friendship that lasted until his last days.
“He deserves the recognition of our people for his sporting success.
And he
left an example even more valuable than that and that is the moment they told him about the possibility of earning a million dollars
.
That young man, the son of a humble family and a humble oriental worker, said that he did not exchange his people for all the dollars in the world ”, the revolutionary leader praised him on September 28, three weeks after the consecration in Munich.
In March 1974, during the XII edition of the Central American and Caribbean Games, in Santo Domingo,
the Cuban, who was studying Electrical Engineering, received another proposal to leave his country's delegation.
The answer was identical
.
The
1976 Montreal Olympics
were a very difficult test for Cuban boxing, as the United States traveled with a first-rate team, which included the legendary Sugar Ray Leonard and four other future world champions: brothers Michael and Leon Spinks, Leo Randolph. and John Tate.
Teófilo Stevenson greets Nelson Madela in Havana in July 1991.
Regardless,
Stevenson was the big figure in Canada
.
He knocked out Senegalese Mamadou Drame in the second round and Finn Pekka Ruokola in the first.
In the semi-final, John Tate ended up sitting in a neutral corner after just 92 seconds of action.
And in the final, the Romanian Mircea Simon gave up in the third round.
Another Olympic gold flew to Havana along with those of Jorge Hernández Padrón (light fly) and Ángel Herrera (feather).
There was an attempt to reunite the Cuban with
Muhammad Ali
in a match between the two heavyweights.
It was in October 1978, five months after Stevenson repeated the title at the AIBA World Cup held in Belgrade and one month after Ali regained the WBA crown against Leon Spinks.
Promoter Bob Arum contacted Raúl Villanueva, president of the Cuban Boxing Federation and Jorge García Bango, head of the Cuban Institute of Sports, Physical Education and Recreation, to
propose a duel between the monarchs of amateurism and professionalism
.
The AIBA had given the go-ahead, on the condition that the Caribbean man did not charge for his participation
(the money would go to the coffers of the Cuban Boxing Federation) and the CBS network was interested in broadcasting the event.
Teófilo Stevenson with Muhammad Ali and Fidel Castro in Havana in 1996.
It did not materialize because the Cubans proposed a series of five three-round bouts
, respecting the rules of amateur sport.
The Americans wanted a single 15-round fight to take place
, in the style of rented boxing.
They never managed to agree.
The boycott promoted by the United States
on the grounds of the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan, which was joined by more than 50 countries (including Argentina, by decision of the Military Junta),
simplified the task for the Cuban pugilism in Moscow 1980
, although for the champion the journey to gold was more complex than in his two previous Olympic experiences.
After defeating the Nigerian Solomon Ataga and the Polish Grzegorz Skrzecz before the limit, he had to listen to the decision of the judges in the semifinal against the Hungarian Istvan Levai,
the first man to complete the three rounds against the Antillean in an Olympic match
.
The same happened in the final
, in which he defeated local Pyotr Zaev.
Even one of the judges, Nicaraguan Marvin Caldera Lacayo, saw the Soviet winner.
Beyond that detail and some whistles with which part of the public dismissed him at the Olympiski Sports Complex,
Stevenson became on July 26 the second boxer to win three Olympic titles
after the Hungarian Laszlo Papp (London 1948, Helsinki 1952 and Melbourne 1956).
During his 20-year career (1966-1986) he won 301 of the 321 fights he fought
.
Pirolo died on June 11, 2012, due to ischemic heart disease, while working to prepare his country's boxers who would go to the London Olympics.
The funerals were massive
.
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