Olympic Hopeful : From That Very First Fight--Before He was 9--Shane Mosley’s Father Knew He Had the Ability, and He Just Keeps on Winning

It did not take long for Shane Mosley to demonstrate that he had a talent for boxing.

His father says he had a strong inclination about his son’s ability after he polished off a more experienced boxer in his first bout before he had reached age 9.

“He beat an open junior,” Jack Mosley remembers. “That’s a guy with 10 or more fights. Shane won Junior Olympic tournaments, regional tournaments. It seemed like he won a regional tournament every year.”

The 17-year-old Mosley has been winning with consistency.

He has been attracting more attention since he defeated Rodney Garnett of the Army in the 132-pound division of the USA-Amateur Boxing Federation Championships last month in Colorado Springs.

“That’s the one we’ve been chasing,” says Mosley’s father, who trains his son. “If we could’ve gotten by Kelcie Banks, we could have won that last year, too.”

After winning the USA-ABF championship last year, Banks competed for the U.S. in the 1988 Olympics at Seoul. Mosley is hoping his son’s victory in the tournament this year will provide the impetus for similar success, although the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona is more than three years away.

But winning the USA-ABF title has meant a difference in the young boxer’s career. It has enabled the 5-8 senior at Pomona High School to move into the No. 1 position in the USA-ABF national rankings at 132 pounds.

It has also qualified him for international bouts, such as his lopsided victory last month over John Erskine of Ireland in the U.S.-Ireland Box-Off at Las Vegas, Mosley’s first international bout.

“When you win a national tournament, you’re No. 1 and that qualifies him for the Olympic Festival trials, the Canada Cup and the Junior World Championships,” his father said. “At the end of the year he should be ready to do his thing.”

“Just being in those tournaments helps a lot,” Shane added. “It helps people notice you and it helps mature you as a boxer.”

Winning the national tournament has also earned him a position in the USA-ABF’s Operation Gold, which helps sponsor the top amateur boxers in the nation. “When they give you money, it’s mostly for training equipment and gloves and stuff like that,” he said. “It helps you a lot, though.”

“I think he still has a lot to learn,” the father said. “He has a lot of physical growing and mental maturing to do and he needs to build more power. He has a lot of room for improvement. It just depends on how great he wants to be. The potential is there.”

Mosley said his son has movement and hand speed. His jab is considered his best punch.

“It keeps people off balance,” Shane said. “All the other punches I use well, but the jab is the one I use best.”

It is Mosley’s quickness that earned him the nickname “Sugar” early in his career.

“They just started calling me that because I was quick and I throw a lot of combinations,” he said. “I was a thinking fighter and I’m still a thinking fighter. I don’t just go out and throw punches for no reason.”

The elder Mosley credits his son’s success partly to all-around athletic ability derived from competing in numerous sports from an early age.

“He had been in karate, T-ball, everything,” he said. “But he wanted to box. So we started him in it and it’s worked out.”

Mosley has competed in football, basketball, track, cross-country, swimming and even dances.

But boxing has always been his first love.

“I just went to the gym and I like to spar and I was energetic,” he said. “I’d just like to get into the ring and fight.”

It hasn’t hurt to have motivation.

“He wants to do it for himself,” his father said. “A lot of parents force their kids into something, like swimming, and they’re no good at it and don’t really want to do it, and then it’s just a bad scene all-around.”

That has never been a problem for Mosley, who trains for two to three hours a day, usually at the Pasadena Youth Athletic Club in Villa Parke.

Mosley said his father has been his trainer all along.

“I feel comfortable with him in my corner, and when he’s not there I do what he’s taught me,” Mosley said. “I listen to other people, too, but he teaches me a lot.

“He’s a hard trainer. He likes people to have endurance. He stresses that. He wants you to be in shape.”

Mosley said he has never had problems getting his training methods across to his son.

“In the gym you have other coaches that lend a hand, but ultimately I work with him,” he said. “I like the boxer-puncher style, and that’s what I’ve tried to teach him. Some guys like to stand there and slug it out, but I like a guy to move around.

“I like a boxer to be flexible and work on arms and legs. Like any other sport, it’s one where perseverance pays off. If you’re true to your sport, your sport will be true to you, and he’s a very hard worker.

“He’s busy, but we’d like to see him busier. The strength and stamina are pretty good.”

Mosley said the fault of not being busier led to losses against Banks and Ed Hopson, another top amateur.

“They took those (fights) from him,” he said. “He beat those guys but he let them off the hook. He’s got to learn to stay on top of those guys. But he’s still maturing.”

Maturing and growing.

The father thinks he will grow and compete at the 147-pound welterweight level by the 1992 Olympics.

“He’ll probably go up soon,” Mosley said. “We’ll see if we can hang in there (at 132 pounds) for the Goodwill Games (in July of 1990 at Seattle). He’s going to start growing, though.”

Even though he says he might be capable of competing as a professional soon, Mosley said the lure of the Olympics is enough to keep him in the amateurs for a few more years.

“If it wasn’t for that, I probably would turn pro at 19, maybe even 18,” he said. “But I will wait until the Olympics.

“Making the Olympic team will make my professional career better. It’s a good steppingstone for a pro career.”

For the moment, Mosley is thinking more about upcoming bouts.

There is the Canada Cup and box-offs against the Soviet Union and Poland in June, the Olympic Festival in July and the Junior World Championships in August.

But he always keeps the Olympic dream in the back of his mind.