07.09.07 – By Gary Jones: Leading up the WBA welterweight boxing championship bout between title holder Miguel Cotto (30-0, 25 KOs) and challenger Shane Mosley (44-4, 37 KOs) on November 10th, a much overlooked fact is that Mosley, 35, has never lost to a fighter shorter than him in his career. In fact, Mosley has always dominated fighters shorter than him. In the case of Cotto, 26, he’s two inches shorter than the 5’9 Mosley, a fact that has been overlooked by many of the boxing experts.
To be exact, Mosley has only lost to two fighters during his career – Vernon Forrest and Winky Wright – both of whom are 6’0″ and 5’101/2 respectively.
That may not seem like much, yet when you factor in Mosley’s seven inch reach advantage (74″ vs. 67″), it begins to look much more in Mosley’s favor. It’s been six years since Mosley fought a fighter that was 5’7, when he destroyed Adrian Stone in a 3rd round KO, in July 2001. Since that time, Mosley has exclusively fought fighters taller than himself. Against fighters smaller than himself, Mosley is undefeated.
The thing that makes Moseley so effective against shorter fighters, like Cotto, is his fast hands and excellent ring movement, which enables him to land fast combinations and then move out of range before his shorter opponents can retaliate with any shots of their own. Mosley also has long arms for his size, an asset that further enables him to bombard his shorter opponents from afar. He’s excellent at making them pay for any shots they want to try and land.
For example, against Stone, a fighter with extraordinary power similar to Cotto, Mosley punished him badly with powerful combinations with the shorter, more powerful fighter would attempt to wade inside on him. Though Stone landed a number of hard shots in the bout, he was quickly overwhelmed by Mosley’s blazing fast combinations, and was soon after taken in the 3rd round. Although Stone never one a title, I’d argue that he was a harder puncher than Cotto, with about the same hand speed. Certainly, Mosley has slowed somewhat since then, but not by much, however.
Also, Cotto is an old-style fighter, a type of Rocky Marciano kind that wades in, making him an easy target for a fighter with a more advanced fighting style like Mosley. Cotto has beaten a couple of fighters in his career that are as tall as Mosley, however, none of them were as close to him in ability or speed, a factor that basically causes me to disqualify them completely from Cotto’s record. It’s one thing beating a fighter taller with lots of talent, and quite another thing to beat a tall fighter with average ability.
Cotto does have things in his favor, namely youth, aggression and perhaps stamina. Normally, that’s enough to beat an older fighter, but in the case of Mosley, he’s aged very well and doesn’t yet show the signs of diminishing reflexes like most aging boxers typically do. Some of that is because he was in few wars in the early portion of his career when he was a dominant lightweight, who defended his title eight times successfully.
Mostly, though, it’s just plain good genetics, something he inherited from his parents. So his age, 35, would be a significant issue if not for his excellent physical condition. The final factor that Mosley has going for his is ability. He was the best pound-for-pound boxer not too long ago, and that’s not something that completely disappears in six years. Whereas Cotto is a fighter that many people consider, well, just a good fighter, but certainly not a pound-for-pound fighter given his plodding style of fighting. He barely escaped with a win over Judah, and if things had been a little different, possibly with a couple less low blows landed, Judah very well may have won the fight. I couldn’t see Judah doing nearly as well against Mosley, not even close.