By Mark Vester
The Los Angeles Times reports that Antonio Margarito's defense of the WBA welterweight title against Shane Mosley, scheduled for January 24, has moved from the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas to Staples Center in California. Promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank told the paper that both sides wanted to stage the fight on the hometown field of both boxers.
"We knew Staples was available, and we made a deal figuring we might as well take the fight to where these fighters' fans are," Arum said.
While it wasn't directly said, the paper hints that a possible motive to move the fight may have to do with the recent release of Mosley's transcript statements that were given to the grand jury that investigated the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative. In the transript, Mosley told the jury that he knew that he was taking the oxygen-boosting drug EPO to prepare for his 2003 rematch with Oscar De La Hoya. He also revealed that he was told to refer to the THG [a designer steroid] as "flaxseed oil."
Keith Kizer, head of the Nevada State Athletic Commission, told The Times that the commission was likely going to confront Molsey on the transcript because the fight had previously told them that he didn't believe that he was taking anything that was on the banned list of the World Anti-Doping Agency. Kizer did tell the paper that he didn't think Mosley moved the fight to avoid possible discipline in Nevada.
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