By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao may end up getting a huge payday for the Shane Mosley fight, but what he won’t likely get is a lot of credit if he ends up beating the 39-year-old Mosley and stopping him in the process. Hardcore fans will see this fight for what it is: A bout between a much younger, still relevant Pacquiao taking on a struggling, fading fighter that hasn’t won a fight in over two years. That’s just the way is.

The casual boxing fans won’t have a clue about how old Mosley is or how long it’s been since he has won fight. They’ll naturally assume that Mosley is the same fighter he once was 10 to 15 years ago. And if Pacquiao beats him soundly, they’ll probably assume that Pacquiao is the greatest thing since sliced bread. This is what happens when you’re management team picks out opponents for name recognition to casual fans rather than matching Pacquiao against guys that are still fighting well.

If Pacquiao was being matched only against fighters that were still fighting well, then a fight between Pacquiao and Mosley and Pacquiao and Antonio Margarito likely would never happen. Margarito was struggling at the time he fought Pacquiao, and had looked terrible in his fight just before the Pacquiao fight. Whatever Margarito was in 2008, he wasn’t the same fighter that fought Pacquiao two years later in late 2010. And Mosley looks nothing like the fighter that fought Oscar De La Hoya twice. He’s older, slower with a seemingly inability to fight hard for more than three or four rounds without gassing out for the rest of the fight.

This means that we will very likely see three or four good rounds followed by eight terribly one-sided rounds where Pacquiao beats up on an exhausted Mosley. It’s good if you’re a fan of Pacquiao and don’t care whether he’s beating up someone that’s fighting back or someone that is just too old to throw. I care though, and I especially care with the asking price for their pay-per-view fight. $55 is too much for a fight that almost promises to be one-sided. I’d like to see Bob Arum whittle that number down a tad to something close to $4.99. I see that as good price given the bad economy and the sky high $4.30 gas that we’re all paying.

I don’t see enough quality fights on the card to justify asking for $55. I don’t care much about watching Wilfredo Vazquez Jr. beat up on an old and depleted Jorge Arce, and I certainly don’t care to see Kelly Pavlik destroy an unknown fighter by the name of Alfonzo Lopez. I wouldn’t mind seeing Pavlik fight a rematch with Sergio Martinez or take on one of the top super middleweights like Lucian Bute or Mikkel Kessler. But I don’t want to pay big cash to see Pavlik beat up on a guy that I have never heard of until recently. I just think Arum needs to lower the price a little. Just enough so that boxing fans can their money’s worth.