If the 33-year-old Shane Mosley were fighting the 33-year-old Floyd Mayweather, it would be the most important match-up thus far this century in boxing. But Mosley is 38, and he is not the faster man in this long-awaited welterweight confrontation Saturday in Las Vegas.
Mayweather will outpoint Mosley somewhat more convincingly than Miguel Cotto outpointed Mosley in 2007, but it won?t be more special than that fight was.
HBO is handling the pay-per-view telecast, as usual. If you want a dazzling view of Mayweather-Mosley, see it in high definition at a movie house, such as the AMC complex at Eastridge Mall in San Jose or the one on Wolfe Road in Cupertino.
It would have been a more dazzling fight along about 2006, the year Mosley said goodbye to the junior middleweight division with two victories over Fernando Vargas while Mayweather was running through fading junior welterweights Arturo Gatti, Sharmba Mitchell and Zab Judah.
Enjoyable though Mosley?s victories over Vargas were, he said he needed time off afterward, just when Mayweather was so hard up for opponents that he settled for plodding Carlos Baldomir in late 2006.
It appears a vacation cost Mosley his best shot at Mayweather.
In 2007, Mayweather fought Oscar De La Hoya in the only conceivably more lucrative bout than Mayweather-Mosley. Then Mayweather retired for a year or so.
Mosley faded a bit by losing to Cotto and aging noticeably, but his smashing victory over Antonio Margarito last year made Mosley more marketable than he had been in years.
So here we are in 2010, with Mosley in better position to beat Mayweather than anyone else Floyd has fought, but not at his peak.
Whether Mayweather prefers never having fought any really first-rate fighter at his best is hard to say, since Mayweather seems to lack sincerity and won?t let us know.
But nothing he can do to Mosley will improve Mayweather?s legacy, certainly not a victory by boring unanimous decision. We all know who Mayweather really needs to beat.
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