Emanuel Steward said one fighter was ‘greatest sporting hero in Mexican history’

What separates the great from the truly great? When it came to Mexico’s numero uno, Emanuel Steward believed the answer was written in moments — the fights that define a career and elevate a fighter beyond his peers.

Widely regarded as one of the finest trainers boxing has ever known, Steward oversaw a conveyor belt of champions forged in the unforgiving Kronk Gym, where only the toughest survived. His influence extended far beyond Detroit, leading him to work with heavyweight greats Lennox Lewis and Wladimir Klitschko, and making him the first American trainer to guide Mexican icon Julio Cesar Chavez.

Steward worked with Chavez for several weeks ahead of his 1994 rematch with Frankie Randall and, in an interview with Geoffrey Ciani published in 2011, explained in detail why he considered Chavez Mexico’s greatest-ever fighter.

“I think that as a boxer he gained his notoriety because of his major accomplishments in big fights. You could be good, but you have to have these signature fights in your career that really mark your greatness. I’d probably say the first one with Meldrick Taylor –– it couldn’t have been more dramatic than that, to come back in a fight that he was trailing in and score a knockout with two seconds left.

“To beat [Edwin] Rosario was a very special thing because of the Mexican and Puerto Rican rivalry. He beat him which was a major thing for all of the Mexican people. Then he beat [Hector] Camacho. He came back and beat Frankie Randall, even though it was controversial where they stopped the fight. Then he knocked out Meldrick Taylor in the return with him. Meldrick was not what he was before, but still, there was a lot of interest and intrigue in that fight.”

Beyond the achievements in the ring, Steward was struck by the extraordinary adoration Chavez inspired in his homeland — an experience that left a lasting impression on one of boxing’s most travelled and respected figures.

“He may be the greatest sporting hero, not just boxer, ever in Mexican history. I never saw anyone be analysed as much as he was. It even exceeded Muhammad Ali. Just on freeways people would be driving their cars and almost crashing trying to just touch his car.

“When he got out of the stadium once when we were at a bullfight, people would pass the word that he was coming. There were probably about 1,000 people in the parking lot when the car pulled up and when he walks in the arena they had his picture all up on the big screen. Each one of the guys who was a bullfighter would have to bring his hat up so it would be thrown up in the air so he could catch it before each one of the bullfights, and when he left they showed it on the screen and the whole stadium just went crazy. I just never saw anything like that before.”

For Steward, greatness was never just about titles or technique. In Chavez, he saw a fighter who delivered in the sport’s defining moments — and whose presence transcended boxing itself, turning him into a national symbol unlike anything even he had encountered before.