By Jason Kim: 38-year-old World Boxing Association welterweight champion Shane Mosley (46-5, 39 KO’s) will likely continue to be avoided in the future by the top welterweights in the division should he get by WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto in their unification bout on January 31st at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Mosley, who has had huge difficulties in trying to line up fights against big named fighters in the division since capturing the WBA title with a 9th round knockout win over Antonio Margarito in January 2009, has had to settle for a fight against Berto instead of a big mega payday against the likes of Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. Mosley is in a no win situation with the Berto fight.

If Mosley loses, then Pacquiao and Mayweather will likely use that as an excuse to not fight him. But if Mosley wins, especially in an impressive manner, then Pacquiao and Mayweather will probably continue to steer well clear of Mosley. In other words, it doesn’t pay off to look to good in beating an opponent. Mosley would be better off letting the Berto fight end up closely contested.

However, Mosley can’t afford to fight that way because Berto has fast hands, good power and youth working for him in his fight with Mosley. This isn’t going to be an easy fight for Mosley for a variety of reasons. Berto is much younger at 26 compared the 38-year-old Mosley, and Berto is perhaps a little faster than Mosley at this point in Shane’s career.

By the time the two step foot in the ring in January, Mosley will have been out of action for an entire year. It may be a good thing to rest of from damaging fights every now and then, but it can’t be a good thing to take this amount of time off at Mosley’s advanced age.

The good thing that Mosley has going for him, however, is that Berto has looked nothing short of horrible in his last two fights against Luis Collazo and Juan Urango in 2009. Berto used to be a brilliant fighter who used his fast hands to throw dazzling combinations to dominate his opponents.

However, Berto has evolved into a punch and grab fighter in the past year, and barely escaped with a win over Collazo in January. This is the same Collazo that Mosley totally dominated in beating by a one-sided 12 round decision in November 2007. But it’s unclear whether Mosley is the same fighter he was back then. Mosley looked great in his last fight against Margarito, but with the year off from boxing, you never can be too sure what Mosley has left in the tank.

But for the sake of argument, if Mosley does get by Berto with ease, Mosley may find himself in the same exact situation where is right now with Mayweather and Pacquiao, the two biggest names in boxing, ignoring him. Mosley doesn’t have the time to wait for them to pick each other off and look his way because by the time that does happen, if it ever does, Mosley might be over 40-years-old, and not young enough to have much of a chance to win.