By Jim Dower: In an article by Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports, Leonard Ellerbe, the CEO of Mayweather Promotions, predicts a “Corrales-type performance” for unbeaten Floyd Mayweather Jr’s May 1st bout against World Boxing Association welterweight champion Shane Mosley. In Mayweather’s bout with Diego Corrales many years ago in 2001, Mayweather completely dominated the tall, slender Corrales, knocking him down five times before the slaughter was finally stopped by Corrales’ corner throwing in the towel.
Oddly enough, that fight was, with the exception of Mayweather’s bout against a 35-year-old Oscar De La Hoya, the last time that Mayweather faced an opponent that was taller than him. On May 1st, the 5’8” Mayweather will be facing Mosley, who will have an inch height advantage over him at 5’9.” Unfortunately, Mosley’s height advantage may be negated by the fact that Mosley is now 38, and hasn’t fought in over a year since beating Antonio Margarito in January 2009.
The advanced age plus the time off for Mosley may be more than what Mayweather needs to pull out another victory when he meets up with Mosley next month. The winner of the fight – likely Mayweather – will have a chance at fighting WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao in what will be a huge mega fight. That fight is the real one that Mayweather is looking for.
However, before he gets to that bout, Mayweather is going to have a real fight on his hands against Mosley. Advanced age or not, Mosley has the best offensive tools that Mayweather has faced in ages and it’s going to take a lot for Mayweather to get a win in this fight. Mayweather has had things easy more or less the past four years because most of his opponents haven’t had the size or the hand speed needed to compete with him.
Zab Judah gave Mayweather some problems early in their bout in 2006. Luckily for Mayweather, Judah tired out after the first six rounds and was dominated by Mayweather in the second half of the fight. Mosley, in contrast, has good stamina and can fight hard for a full 12 rounds. Mayweather won’t be able to simply beat him by running and shooting pot shots.
He’s going to have to actually fight Mosley if he wants to get past the 38-year. This fight could break Pay-Per-View records. Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer is predicting that it will end up getting 3 million PPV buys, which would eclipse the 2.4 million PPV buys that Mayweather vs. De La Hoya made in 2007.
Comments are closed.