Aguilar goes from training Tallahassee fighters to boxing HOF induction

By St. Clair Murraine
Outlook staff writer

Whenever Rodolfo Aguilar pulls up his seat as a ringside judge, he tends to get tunnel vision. 

Not even in a title fight he sees a champion and a challenger. Aguilar, a Panama native who challenged twice for the world lightweight title, began judging boxing matches about three years ago.

“There is no name in boxing,” Aguilar said, explaining how he views the two men that he is judging. “It’s just round by round. You don’t score by name. If I’m working a four-round fight or a 12-round fight it’s the same for me.

“I’m going to be fair to the fighters because I was a fighter before. You have to be honest.”

Aguilar spent almost 19 years as a professional boxer. Retirement from the ring has been filled with adventures for the right hander, who learned early how to fight as a southpaw and never converted.

He won a round with lymphoma before he got into judging fights.

He spent his first few years out of the ring training fighters, including former world-ranked Henry Akinwande and former light heavyweight champion Tavoris Cloud.

Tallahassee became his home and he even trained Jodi Kombrink during a six-fight career before she became his wife 18 years ago. They have three sons – a 16-year-old and 10-yearold twins — that Aguilar said he won’t encourage to take up a career in the ring.

Two weekends ago, Aguilar reached another plateau when he was inducted into the Florida Boxing Hall of Fame. He was recommended by veteran fight judge, Mike Ross, himself a 2015 inductee.

“I recommended Rodolfo because he was an outstanding boxer,” Ross said. “Very skilled. I think he learned the ropes as a professional fighter.

“I knew Rodolfo’s credits. I saw him fight. He was a great fighter. He is a very humble guy. A very nice guy. He is definitely one of the best fighters to come out of Panama.”

The class of inductees also included Antonio Tarver, Glen Johnson, Jameel McCline,  Danny Santiago, Frankie Randall (posthumously), Marcel Clay and Danny Sanchez. In all 23 were  inducted during the ceremony in Tampa.

“I’m excited. Happy,” Aguilar said of the induction. “I believe in God and he is the reason why everything happens.”

Aguilar started boxing by happenstance when he found himself at a boxing gym in Panama City. A friend asked him to take on two guys in the gym. He managed to beat one and decided he did well enough to pursue a career in the ring, eventually compiling a 37-8-3 record.

A little more than five years into his career he found himself standing in a corner opposite to Mexican legend Julio Cesar Chavez. He didn’t leave with the title in his first fight in America, but he eventually found a home on the West Coast where he lived for three years before moving to Tallahassee.

In addition to judging fights, Aguilar is an operations director for the International Boxing Association. He has sworn off being a trainer.

Many prospects don’t have the old-school discipline, he said.

“I think judging fights is easier than training fighters because the fighter has to be disciplined,” he said. “The same way I did it, I want them to do it. If I say be there at 11 o’clock in the morning that means you have to be there at 11 o’clock in the morning.”