By Eric Thomas: it pays off sometimes to be ambitious, but in Mosley’s case it may turn out to hurt him. He wants a fight with World Boxing Association welterweight champion Antonio Margarito next, that is, if Mosley is successful in defeating former two-time champion Ricardo Mayorga (29-6-1, 23 KOs) this Saturday at the Staples Center, in Los Angeles, California. A fight with the bigger, taller Margarito would almost be suicidal for the smaller Mosley no matter what at what point of his career, but now that he’s 37 and not as active in the ring that he used to be, it’s a move doomed for failure.

However, first things first, he’s got Mayorga, 34, to worry about this Saturday night. At one time in his career, in 2003, the offensively unorthodox Mayorga was arguably the best welterweight on the planet bar none. Although some might argue that Mosley or Oscar De La Hoya would have perhaps been able to beat him during this time, I tend to doubt it seriously, and think they would have been beaten soundly by him at this stage in his career. Those years are gone, however, as Mayorga has struggled in the past five years, losing three out of six fights and looking pretty much washed up as a fighter.

He no longer fights at welterweight, having put on weight on his once lean frame. He’s still one of the top light middleweights in the division, ranked #3 in the WBC, but that’s probably only because of the less than stellar quality fighters in the division – one of the weakest in all of boxing. You need proof? De La Hoya, a fighter most boxing experts feel is way past his prime, is incredibly ranked #1 in the WBC and WBO. The light middleweight division is the elephant’s graveyard for old, past their prime former champions that can no longer compete at lower or higher weight classes against younger, more energetic fighters.

Mayorga would have been the perfect opponent for Mosley five years ago, but right now he probably won’t have a chance. Mayorga has aged slightly worse than Mosley, and appears to have less to offer. He is still effective for four to five rounds, as he showed in his 12-round majority decision win against Fernando Vargas last November, but he fades badly after the midpoint of his fights. He’s been inactive since that fight, however, and will be coming into the ring with a lot of ring on Saturday night with a lot of rust.

The same can be said of Mosley, who fought incredibly well in his last fight, a 12-round unanimous decision loss to Miguel Cotto in November. Regrettably, instead of taking advantage of his good performance in that fight and taking on another good opponent soon after, Mosley instead stayed out of boxing for 10 months, wasting time. He was close to fighting Zab Judah, though, but that fight fell through when Judah injured himself and wasn’t able to make the fight. At 37, Mosley is still a good fighter, but probably not world class anymore, at least not as welterweight anymore.

I think he might possibly be good enough to beat someone like WBC light middleweight champion Vernon Forrest, whom he’s previously been beaten twice by, but that’s a still a big maybe. At that point, I think Mosley will struggle against Mayorga, who will not only be the bigger and stronger fighter, but who has an aggressive style much like Vernon Forrest’s 2002 championship form. If Mosley gets into a slugging match with Mayorga in the first few rounds, which I can see happening, Mosley may get knocked down once or twice and possibly stopped.

Mayorga still fights well in the early rounds, albeit with much less hand speed than he did a few years ago, and still can hit plenty hard enough to take out Mosley. Likewise, Mayorga’s unorthodox punches, which come in at all angles, will be no doubt something hard for Mosley to deal with. I can see Mosley possibly trying to take a page out of De La Hoya’s fight with Mayorga by rushing him and trying to hurt him with a flurry of shots to take him out.

In De La Hoya’s case, it worked but it very well could have backfired on De La Hoya had Mayorga been able to survive 6th round blitz. If that was the case, then De La Hoya, who injured himself in his attack, would have lost to him. I think Mosley won’t fall into that trap and will probably be able to beat Mayorga, but that’s as far as it goes. Margarito, if they do fight, will destroy Mosley even worse than he did Miguel Cotto. Mosley’s too old to be in with the young lions like Margarito, and will only get eaten up if they do fight.