By Rick Reeno

Golden Boy Promotions president Oscar De La Hoya spoke with BoxingScene.com about the upcoming welterweight collision between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and WBA welterweight champion Shane Mosley, scheduled for May 1 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. De La Hoya is confident the public will get their monies worth because the fight will end with a knockout. He doesn't anticipate a chess match because Mosley plans to put a lot of pressure on Mayweather from the start.

“It’s a classic fight. It’s one of those classic fights that only comes around every 30 to 40 years. Mayweather-Mosley will be something special. A fight that people don’t want to miss. I know for a fact that it’s going to end with a knockout,” De La Hoya said.

Because De La Hoya is a common opponent for both fighters, he is one of the more qualified individuals to compare their strengths and weaknesses. He dropped two decisions to Mosley, and a close split decision to Mayweather in 2007. De La Hoya explained the factors involved in the fight. Based on our conversation, De La Hoya is tipping Mosley’s advantage in power to be the equalizer.

“Boxing ability, both have. Speed, both have. Power, only one of them has and that’s why I know what the outcome is going to be. It depends on who sticks to their gameplan for the length of the fight. You have to make sure that you don’t get distracted because one distraction and it could be over,” De La Hoya said.

“I feel Mosley really wants it. I don’t think those two fighters are going to take this fight lightly because if one of them does, that’s who’s going down, so I believe it’s going to be about strategy, power, obviously timing of a punch. There are going to be a lot of factors that will come into play and power will be one of them.”

Mayweather’s defense gave De La Hoya a lot of problems in their fight, but he doesn’t see those same problems coming up for Mosley.

“He has a very unique defense, very unique. I feel that defense of Mayweather can really trick you into making a lot of mistakes but with the people who are in Mosley’s corner, I don’t see that happening,” De La Hoya said.

Three weeks ago, De La Hoya traveled up to Big Bear, California to watch Mosley spar for twelve hard rounds with four different boxers. According to De La Hoya, Mosley was handling all of them with ease. Mosley was overpowering them and throwing a lot of hard punches without getting tired. Mosley is already in fighting shape. He was scheduled to fight Andre Berto on January 30. Several of Berto's family members were affected by the disaster in Haiti. He withdrew from the fight to take care of his family in Haiti. The fight fell apart with less than two weeks to go.

“Power is something Mosley does possess, especially after watching him spar three weeks ago up in Big Bear. I saw him spar twelve rounds with four different guys. He was handling the sparring partners that I used for Mayweather and he was handling them easy. So he really took me by surprise. I was really impressed,” De La Hoya said.