By Dave Lahr: As skilled as 39-year-old Shane Mosley (46-6-1, 39 KO’s) is, it won’t take more than 75% of his former abilities to get by the little 5’6″ Manny Pacquiao (52-3-2, 38 KO’s) on May 7th at the MGM Grand, in Las Vegas, Nevada. That’s how good Mosley is. His skills are far better than what Pacquiao has going for him. If Mosley can fight better than he did in his last two fights against Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Sergio Mora, then he beats Pacquiao. There won’t be any of the catchweight nonsense in this fight, thank God. Pacquiao won’t have a big handicap working on his side in this fight, other than the fact that he’s seven years younger and slightly faster than Mosley.

Those advantages can be easily nullified by Mosley if he can up his game to the point where it was two years ago when he stopped Antonio Margarito in the 9th. Mosley was fighting at about 75% of his former skills in that bout, but in his last two fights, Mosley appears to have dipped to only 50%. That’s not good enough to beat Pacquiao. I think Mosley can give Pacquiao a lot of problems fighting at 50%, but he’ll come up short. Mosley needs that extra 25% to beat Pacquiao.

I think he can do it on adrenalin. He knows that if he wins this fight it will set up a huge money rematch with Pacquiao and will likely put him in another rematch with Floyd Mayweather. Mosley would be getting an additional two huge paydays beyond this one if he beats Pacquiao on May 7th. I think that could be the needed medicine to nurse Mosley to victory in this fight.