Leroy Neiman Sketchbook

Cuba Has Always Produced Great Fighters among the little men: The immortal featherweight from Havana, Kid Chocolate, is a national treasure, and fight lovers will never forget Kid Gavilan's famous bolo punch. Cuban boxers take pride in their style and cunning. The objective is not only to knock an opponent out but to knock him out with class. Today the Grand Master of Cuban boxing is 6'5" reigning Olympic heavyweight champion Teofilo Stevenson. Jamaican born, soft spoken, polite, dignified (though somewhat condescending when giving interviews), Stevenson is an impressive figure. On his own turf, Stevenson's reputation as a ladies' man is legend. In the ring, the straight-up puncher addresses his opponents with disdain. And not without reason. I first sketched him destroying Duane Bobick at the Munich Olympic Games in 1972, then again at the Montreal Olympics in 1976, when he made short work of John Tate, today a ranking pro. In the 1979 Pan-American Games, Stevenson impatiently flattened both of his opponents in less than a round each. Among boxers, he's in a class by himself.