Shane Mosley’s September comeback will have a reduced viewership due to Golden Boy deciding to air his comeback fight against Sergio Mora on an independent, non-HBO affiliated PPV.
Mosley (46-6, 39 KOs), who only one a round against Floyd Mayweather in their May superfight, will be moving up to junior middleweight. Mora (22-1, 6 KOs), who’s spent the majority of his career at the weight, defeated Calvin Green by TKO on April 3 on the Jones-Hopkins II undercard.
According to Fight Hype, HBO declined their services after failing to secure Mosley-Berto. That fight was originally supposed to be held in Janaury, but was canceled after Berto pulled out due to losing 8 family members in the Haiti earthquake tragedy. This time the fight has fallen through due Mosley’s promoter (Golden Boy) refusing to agree to Berto request for a 50-50 purse split.
With boxing not holding strong PPV power outside of Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao, HBO Sports President has greatly scaled back the network’s support of PPVs and fights deemed to have low appeal. The company passed on the Jones-Hopkins II PPV in April, and announced last week that they would no longer cover heavyweight fights.
Mosley last competed in the junior middleweight division in 2006, where he scored two knockouts over Fernando Vargas. Recently his schedule has been very limited, fighting just once in 2009 and 2010 respectively. He will celebrate his 39th birthday in September and is in his 17th year as a fighter.
Mora’s bout earlier this year was his first since losing his WBC 154 pound title via a wide decision to the late Vernon Forrest in 2008.
The fight is scheduled for September 18.
This is a dangerous fight for Mosley, and one where he can end up looking just as old and slow as he did in the Mayweather fight. What Mora lacks in knockout power he makes up for with a very high punch output. That is how he wore out an older Vernon Forrest in their first fight in early 2008. Forrest won the rematch by outboxing Mora behind a stiff, authoritative jab, something Mosley is not adept at doing. Without that tool, Mosley will have to outwork in the trenches, the type of bruising war of attrition that older fighters lack the stamina to pull off.
HBO’s recent decision marks a crossoroads for the network. HBO has long been the “star network,” giving preferential treatment to name fighters even if said fighter was battling an overmatched opponent. By finally saying no to overpriced PPV cards just because one fighter carries some starpower, HBO will now have to follow Showtime’s model of looking to make competitive, exciting matchups to draw fans in. The most glaring examples of Showtime’s superior boxing approach is how they developed junior welterweight over the last two years through challenging bouts (against Junior Witter, Nate Campbell, Kendall Holt, and Lamont Peterson), and their acclaimed Super Six 168 pound tournament.
Time will tell if promoters also get the message and stop with the unnecessary PPVs.
Beats, Boxing and Mayhem 