By Jason Kim: I don’t know whether or not he’s deceiving himself or if he knows something that we don’t know, but the 37 year-old Shane Mosley (44-5, 37 KOs) believes that he’s going to be back among the top fighters in boxing if he defeats former welterweight champion Ricardo Mayorga (29-6-1, 23 KOs) tonight at the Staples Center, in Los Angeles, California. This bout has war written all over, with neither fighter a guarantee lock to come out the victor at this point. It’ll be a case of whether Mosley’s speed and brilliance will match up well with Mayorga’s power and size, and youth.
Coming off a nearly a year away from boxing, Mosley will be a year older, and it’s a big question mark how much he’ll have left tonight. He had a hard fight in his last bout, a 12-round decision loss to Miguel Cotto, and he may have been used up somewhat from that fight. Although the year off may help him somewhat because he hasn’t been forced to take hard punches, but he’s beginning to show his age despite what he says about “thirty is the new twenty.” It may very well be for some people, but in the case of Mosley, he looks all of 37 to me, maybe even able to pass for 40. I have no questions that Mosley may end up in the thick of things if he does end up beating Mayorga tonight, because after all, Mosley is with Golden Boy Promotions, who will make it possible for him to fight one of the top fighters like Antonio Margarito, who Mosley badly wants to fight, but that doesn’t mean he belongs in the ring with him.
To be honest, Mosley belongs in the ring with Margarito about as much as Oscar De La Hoya does, meaning that if Mosley does end up fighting Margarito, you’ll see Mosley taking the beating of his life and probably getting retired in the process. That’s the way I see it. A fight against Mayorga, though, is right up Mosley’s alley, one that he could probably win if he doesn’t get into a slugging match with the Nicaraguan fighter in the early rounds. Both of them have gillion miles on them, and with that much mileage anything can happen. Mosley fought well against Cotto, though somewhat passive in the early rounds, but came on in the second half, putting Cotto on the run.
Mosley will probably elect to try and take the fight to Mayorga, and count on connecting with a big shot to take him out. Mosley, though, doesn’t hit as hard as De La Hoya or Felix Trinidad, the two fighters that have taken Mayorga out in the past four years. What Mosley does have is vastly superior boxing skills, speed and ring intelligence that he can possibly use to squeeze out a close decision over Mayorga. I don’t, however, think for a second that Mosley will be able to stop him. Mayorga’s a naturally bigger fighter than Mosley, and will be able to take his biggest shots without problem. On top of that, Mayorga is coming into tonight’s fight the best shape he’s been in years, and will finally have the conditioning that he’s been missing in many of his fights in the past four years.