By Dan Ambrose: In an article by Ron Borges at the Sweetscience.com, Floyd Mayweather Jr. (40-0, 25 KO’s) talks about why he’s chosen to fight World Boxing Association welterweight champion Shane Mosley (46-5, 39 KO’s), saying “I could have easily gone on a world tour fighting stiffs and made $200 million but it’s about testing my skills against fighters of my era.” I guess this is why Mayweather fought lightweight Juan Manuel Marquez in his last fight in September. It was about testing his abilities against the best fighters.

Mayweather will be facing Mosley on May 1st at the MGM Grand, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Before Mayweather’s fight against Marquez last year, Mayweather had been out of boxing for two years after retiring shortly after his fight against light welterweight Ricky Hatton in December 2007. Mayweather came back last year to make money. He immediately eyed Manny Pacquiao for a fight that would have made him and the Filipino star a huge amount of money each.

However, Mayweather messed things up by insisting on random blood tests to take place leading up to the fight. Eventually, Mayweather’s fight with Pacquiao went down the drain over this very issue. Now Mayweather is looking to fight Mosley in May, and then if he gets out of that fight in one piece, try to work out a fight against Pacquiao later on in 2010.

It’s doubtful that Mayweather could make $200 million fighting stiffs. For that to happen, Floyd would have had to stick around for a lot longer than he’d like and risk taking all kinds of punishment along the way. At 32, Mayweather has yet to show signs of slowing down as a fighter, but as we’ve seen in the case of Roy Jones Jr., another fighter who relies on fast hand speed, Mayweather could start showing problems of slowing down by the time he reaches his mid 30s. By then, he could be finding himself having big problems against even stiffs if he’s still fighting by then.

As for Mosley, Mayweather says that he plans on fighting smart, and focusing on out-boxing the older, less mobile Shane. Mayweather obviously won’t be trying to stand in front of Mosley, not after seeing what happened to Antonio Margarito in Mosley’s last fight. Margarito had little foot movement and was a sitting duck for Mosley’s in and out attacks in their January 2009 fight.

Mosley ended up taking the fight by a 9th round stoppage. The win was a real eye opener for some fans, which saw Mosley as being past it due to his poor performance against Ricardo Mayorga in the fight prior to Margarito in September 2008. However, Mosley looked completely revitalized against Margarito, and fought like his old self from years earlier.

The question is whether we’ll be seeing the Mosley that fought Margarito or the one that struggled to beat Mayorga when he steps in the ring to face Mayweather. It might not matter which version of Mosley we see. Mayweather might be too good for Mosley anyway. Mayweather’s style of fighting, in which he uses movement and pin point strikes is one that Mosley isn’t really accustomed to facing. Indeed, Mosley perhaps has never come close to fighting anyone like Mayweather before. For this reason, it’s difficult to say for sure how Mosley will react to Mayweather’s style of fighting.