"Sugar" Shane Mosley (born September 7, 1971) is a boxer who has won three world titles and beaten Oscar De La Hoya twice.

Mosley started out as Lightweight Champion. He was highly respected, defending his title 8 times, but did not have mainstream recognition. He would gain much recognition however by fighting WBC Welterweight Champion Oscar De La Hoya. De La Hoya was perhaps the most popular fighter in boxing, with only one controversial loss to Felix Trinidad. Mosley-De La Hoya was a 12 round war, but Mosley won a clear split decision. De La Hoya, who disagreed with the decision in his fight against Trinidad, did not complain about this decision. He said that when he fought Trinidad he did not feel like a beaten fighter, but when he fought Mosley he indeed felt like he had lost the fight.

After his win over De La Hoya, Mosley garnered a great deal of respect from the boxing world. When Trinidad lost to Bernard Hopkins, Mosley inherited the title as best pound for pound fighter in the world.

He ran a successful string of defenses of his Welterweight title, but against three unheralded fighters. When he finally did step up his competition, it was against former Olympian Vernon Forrest. Forrest with a great jab, and with a hard right hand battered the undefeated Mosley and won a lopsided decision against him, taking Mosley's title. In the rematch, Mosley suffered a similar loss.

On February 8, 2003, Mosley's bout with former IBF world Jr. Middleweight champion Raul Marquez ended in a no contest when Mosley accidentally head butted Marquez twice in round three.

He and De La Hoya faced each other for the second time on September 13, this time with De La Hoya's WBC and WBA world Jr. Middleweight belts on the line. Mosley defeated De La Hoya by a 12 round unanimous decision, and joined the exclusive group of world boxing champions that have reigned in three or more divisions. Many fans believed De La Hoya won the fight, but most experts agreed with the decision. Mosley was out-boxed by De La Hoya for the first part of the fight, but won the second part of the fight by being aggressive against the tiring De La Hoya.

On January 9, 2004, news ran across that the FBI was involved in an investigation into the De La Hoya rematch. According to the news, the fight's judges that night might have been bribed by outside forces to score the fight for Mosley, something Mosley and his handlers might not have been aware of. This however turned out to be untrue, as no evidence was turned up of any fix, and the reports of this particular fight being fixed were basically started by an unfounded remark by an FBI agent. Mosley was later also mentioned as part of an FBI investigation on athletes using steroids, but again no evidence was turned up of this. Mosley was rumored to be on steroids because he had become much more muscular since he had come up from Lightweight, but Mosley attributed this to lifting weights which he could not do at Lightweight because it would have made him too heavy for that weight. Mosley, who had been on a weight lifting team before he turned pro, continues to come into fights very muscled, but has never been found to be on steroids.

On March 13, 2004, Mosley lost his WBC and WBA world Jr. Middleweight titles in an unification bout with IBF world champion Winky Wright, by a unanimous twelve round decision. Wright, a fighter who like Mosley prior to the De La Hoya fight was widely respected in the boxing community but not a mainstream name, used his great jab, defense, and southpaw stance to confuse and out-box Mosley. He humiliated Mosley throughout the fight, out-working and out-smarting him. Wright, however, appreciated Mosley for giving him a chance to participate in a big fight, and gave Mosley a rematch.

Eight days later, on March 21, Mosley announced that he split from his father, manager and trainer, Jack Mosley, on a professional level.

On November 20, Mosley and Wright had a rematch. Although the second time around the fight was scored much closer by the three judges (115-113 twice for Wright and a 114-114 tie), Mosley, nevertheless, was clearly defeated again, by a twelve round majority decision. Mosley felt he won the fight, and looked better in this fight than he had in many of his previous fights, but was still no match for the bigger Wright, whose boxing style is one of the most difficult to penetrate.

Shane Mosley returned to action as a Welterweight, defeating the previously undefeated David Estrada by a ten round unanimous decision at the Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, Nevada, on April 23, 2005, as part of the Margarito-Cintron ESPN Pay Per View undercard. His next fight will be against undefeated Jose Luiz Cruz. If Mosley wins this match, he might possibly fight undisputed Welterweight Champion Zab Judah.

Mosley currently holds a record of 40 wins, 4 losses and 1 no contest, with 35 knockouts.

Credit: en.wikipedia.org