Griffith was one of my favorites. I saw him fight MANY times at the Garden and he always put on a great show. Rodriquez was a great fighter to watch, too.

A couple of random thoughts:

I was at the Garden on Feb 12th, 1965 to see Rodriquez fight "Hurricane" Carter (Rodriquez won a unanimous decision). My brother got us ringside seats and I got Rocky Graziano's autograph on the cover of the program. Emile Griffith was sitting right near us and I got him to sign a picture (inside the program) of him and Rodriquez in the ring when Griffith won the title. Emile signed it "My Best Fight, Emile Griffith".

My prize autograph is on the back page of the "New York Post" dated March 10, 1967. I was there with my brother-in-law to see the last fight at the "old" Garden (Ismael Laguna vs. Frankie Narvaez). Laguna won in a unanimous decision but many of Narvaez's fans didn't like the call and started a riot. We had ringside seats and hadda hightail it off the floor when bottles started coming flying down from the upper deck. Hell, they even threw the organ down from upstairs! ..... Anyway, after our escape from the Garden we walked across the street only to see Muhammad Ali in the parking garage. He was surrounded by four of the biggest bodyguards you ever saw but I fought my way through them and handed him the newspaper so he could sign it. The "Post" had a picture of him posing with Wilt Chamberlain (the caption of the picture had his name as Cassius Clay). He graciously signed the paper and smiled when he handed it back to me.