Does Shane Still Have the “Sugar,” or Will he Get Caned?

Shane Mosley came back to us in April with a victory over little-known David Estrada; it was his first victory in over fifteen months. Shane Mosley started out as the unbeatable and invincible 135-pound rocket that won the IBF lightweight title in August of 1997 from Phillip Holiday and made seven successful defenses of that title,

all by knockout. “Sugar Shane” was almost invincible with his incredible hand speed and seemingly unbeatable formula. After his victory over Oscar de la Hoya in the summer of 2000, he was set to be the new face of boxing. But Vernon Forrest changed all that with two sound ring schoolings in January and July of 2002. Mosley seemed to be a fighter who could not adapt to a specific strategy and this proved to be evident in his outings with Ronald “Winky” Wright.

After going 38-0 with thirty-five knockouts, he has only won two of six recent fights. Mosley’s lone meaningful victory was a disputed unanimous decision over Oscar de la Hoya in September 2003. Even in that fight, as well as in the two “Winky” Wright fights, he was seen often just loading up with one shot at a time, not being the speedster we are all used to seeing. Shane Mosley’s undoing is placing blame on his trainers. He fired his father and hired Joe Goossen after the first “Winky” Wright fight, which he lost by ten rounds to two. For the second “Winky” Wright fight, Shane was outclassed again and fired Goossen. Enter John David Jackson, little-known, but at least he has Shane thinking that he is a great again.

The one thing that happened to Shane is that he got overconfident too often, and the argument stands that Oscar de la Hoya made his career. He is out to prove that he can be a force at welterweight again, but if he gets one more bad decision loss, I think he should hang it up. Because since his lightweight days, where he threw heavy volume punches with blazing speed, that speed has not been seen in five years. He can beat Zab Judah, and possibly Antonio Margarito but when Oscar comes back to the division it could be his last fight. Oscar remains focused on his comeback, and is still almost two years younger than Mosley (who will be thirty-four in September).

Mosley is still a Hall-of-Fame fighter, but the days in which he was the best fighter on the planet are over and his best days are behind him.

David Shipman can be reached at davidshipman1@yahoo.com