Luis “Louie” Coria’s professional boxing career started in Indio, CA with Antonio and Joel Diaz. He’s a tall featherweight with a good reach and gave stablemate Vergil Ortiz one of his toughest fights as an amateur. He quickly made his way to a 4-0 record with the Diaz brothers. His father plays a big part in his career and is always in the gym keeping a watchful eye. His father Louie Sr. works supervising a staff of over 150 employees in Corona, CA. The family moved from the Coachella Valley to Moreno Valley back in 2017 to make the commute easier on Louie Sr. for work purposes. This opened up the opportunity for Louie Jr. to train out of Robert Garcia’s gym. It was there that Garcia approached Louie Jr. to seek him out as a sparring partner for Abner Mares. At the time Mares was training with Garcia for his second fight with Leo Santa Cruz.
Louie’s first bout with Garcia as his new trainer did not go as planned. At the Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, CA Louie suffered his first loss as a pro. He was knocked down in the first round and lost a unanimous four round decision. Two months later Garcia helped Louie bounce back on a card in Lancaster where he earned a TKO in the 4th round. Not even a month later another win came his way in Tijuana, Mexico. Now with a 6-1 win record he landed on the undercard of Mikey Garcia versus Sergey Lipinets in San Antonio, TX where he earned a unanimous decision in a four round fight.
Louie then went on to headline his own show under Matt McGovern at the Agua Caliente Casino in Rancho Mirage, CA where he and his stablemate Izaac Colunga both sold several hundred tickets. With an 8-1 record Louie in the summer of 2018 landed on the undercard of Mikey Garcia versus Robert Easter at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, CA where he moved from four round bouts to six rounds. With that win he improved to 9-1 proving that the bout back in 2017 versus Percy Peterson in Carson was just a bad night and nothing more.
In the winter of 2018 boxing promoter Michelle “Raging Babe” Rosado was organizing a card in Tucson, AZ when one of the main event athletes pulled out of the fight. Rosado was in a serious pinch scrambling to find a replacement with just a couple weeks before the event was scheduled. She reached out to Garcia and asked if he had any featherweights in his stable that were willing to take the B side main event bout against a home town favorite. Garcia reached out to Louie and his father and asked if they were interested in a fight with Thomas Valdez in his backyard with only a two week notice. Garcia had a prior commitment with another one of his fighters Brandon “Bam Bam” Rios in Kansas and would have to leave the corner work to his father, Eduardo “Big G” Garcia and assistant trainer Jose “Chepe” Contreras for the Coria versus Valdez bout. Louie and his father agreed to take on the bout and it was a great fight between the two fighters but it resulted in Louie’s second loss of his pro career.
With a record of 9-2 Louie headlined the first Garcia Promotions event in San Bernardino, CA in January of 2019. He and several other local fighters sold out the venue selling a couple thousand tickets to the very much anticipated event. Louie delivered with a spectacular knockout in the third round over his opponent. Shortly thereafter Louie again landed another TKO win on another Mikey Garcia undercard, this time in Arlington, TX while Mikey took on Errol Spence. Another TKO win came in the summer of 2019 for Louie, he was gaining momentum for what would be a showdown with Top Rank prospect Adam “BluNose” Lopez in the winter of 2019. Unfortunately an opponent for the main event (Oscar Valdez) of that card fell out last minute and Adam Lopez was moved into the main event slot, leaving Louie without a fight. Fortunately Louie was given the opportunity to fight Lopez on the ESPN Summer Series by Top Rank in June of 2020. The decision didn’t come out in Louie’s favor but what it did prove was that he was able to compete with the best fighters Top Rank had to offer.
Louie’s next fight was on Halloween of 2020 against undefeated Brazilian Olympian Gold Medalist Robson Conceicao again in Las Vegas, NV. Again Louie was on the bad end of a decision despite knocking down his opponent in the second round and Conceicao being docked two points in two separate rounds for low blows. Judge Eric Cheek gave a score of 94 to 93 meaning he gave every round to Conceicao except for the second round where he was dropped and the fourth and sixth, where Conceicao was deducted a point for low blows. Judges John McKaie and Don Trella scored the bout 95-92, which I can’t figure out using the 10 point must system. One thing was for sure, this was Louie’s second loss to an A side Top Rank fighter.
Again lighting struck as Louie showcased his skills on the undercard of his stablemate Jose Ramirez versus Josh Taylor in May of 2021. The Virgin Hotel in Las Vegas was the host and the opponent was Enrique Vivas. This time Louie didn’t just drop his opponent once but twice and Vivas was deducted a point for a low blow in the fourth. The judges Glen Feldman, Patricia Morse Jarman and Chris Migliore all scored the fight 75-74 in favor of Vivas, where mathematically they gave every round to Vivas, except the third and fourth rounds where Louie scored a knockdown or a point was deducted from Vivas. The bout was a total of eight rounds.
All these decisions not in Louie’s favor have led to a record of 12-5. This has inspired me to write this article on the eve of the bout between Oscar Valdez and Robson Conceicao. Reverse the decisions in Louie’s last two bouts where his opponents not only hit the canvas but received point deductions for fouls, and he could have a record of 14-3 and could easily be in contention for a title. Reverse the decision versus Adam Lopez and he could be 15-2. We are living in a post Floyd Mayweather era where so much weight is being placed on a fighter’s record. Only situations like Gabe Rosado upsetting Bektemir “The Bully” Melikuziev give me hope for fighters like the talented Louie Coria reaching the ultimate goal of becoming a world champion. Rosado’s current record is 26-13-1 and he is in contention for a world title fight versus undefeated Middleweight Champion Jaime Munguia 37-0.
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