Better Late Than Never for Mosley

Sugar Shane Mosley probably can’t tell you the exact price of gold, but, based on his experience, he would guess that it’s somewhere in excess of $100 million.

That’s roughly the difference in his and Oscar De La Hoya’s earnings in the ring since they turned professional in 1992. No one, with the possible exception of the IRS, had the exact figures handy Monday. But Mosley’s handlers estimated that he has made $3.5 million in purses. De La Hoya made $38 million in purses last year, $23 million for one fight against Felix Trinidad Jr. That’s not counting the additional millions De La Hoya earned from endorsement deals with companies such as McDonald’s and MCI.

Mosley doesn’t have to wonder where he went wrong. It was in Worcester, Mass.

As amateurs, they were ranked No. 1 in the United States in their respective weight classes. If you asked the experts which had a brighter future, the 132-pound De La Hoya from East L.A. or the 139-pound Mosley from Pomona, as many would have said Mosley as De La Hoya. In fact, Mosley once defeated De La Hoya at Villa Park Recreation Center in Pasadena when they were preteens.

But on June 12, 1992, Mosley was upset in the semifinals of the U.S. Olympic trials in Worcester. Considering that his conqueror was Vernon Forrest, the loss doesn’t seem as bad today as it did then. But, at the time, it was devastating. De La Hoya won that day and again two days later, earning a berth on the Olympic team in Barcelona, where he became the lone U.S. boxer to win a gold medal.

He returned home as “the Golden Boy,” signed with one of the sport’s most important promoters, Bob Arum, and within four months was fighting in Las Vegas. Within another year, he was winning his first world title.

Mosley signed with a local promoter and more than three years later couldn’t draw a full house at the Irvine Marriott.

“He was on the fast train,” Mosley said Monday of De La Hoya. “I was on the slow train.”

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Funny then that both should arrive at the same time at the same station.

“Destiny,” Arum called it when announcing Monday at Staples Center that Mosley and De La Hoya will fight there June 17. Mosley will earn at least $4.5 million for the pay-per-view fight, De La Hoya at least $8 million, but Mosley said that the money doesn’t mean as much as the opportunity to fight for De La Hoya’s WBC welterweight title belt.

That’s the belt he received Monday from the WBC, which stripped it from Trinidad because he graduated to a higher weight division. De La Hoya and Mosley, old friends that they are, had a moment of fun with it, using the belt in a game of tug-of-war while posing for photographers.

Mosley has maintained his sense of humor despite having wasted the early years of his professional career in boxing’s bush league, fighting as much outside the ring as he tried through legal channels to escape his initial promotional contract.

Arum recognized Mosley’s potential, first touted by De La Hoya’s father, Joel, and once tried to lure him into his Top Rank camp. Arum backed off when threatened with a lawsuit for tortious interference. Mosley was the only one who felt tortured, languishing until his contract expired in 1996.

He has been on a faster track since signing with international promoter Cedric Kushner, winning a title himself and earning fighter-of-the-year honors in 1998 from the Boxing Writers Assn. of America.

But there was little question Monday which fighter will be listed first on the marquee.

Mosley’s camp insisted on equal time at the news conference. That wasn’t as easy as it sounds. Alan Springer, the KCBS producer who assembled the four-minute video of the two fighters, said he had no difficulty finding De La Hoya highlights because virtually all of his 33 professional fights have been televised. Springer, however, could find tape of no more than four or five Mosley fights.

Mosley did have a publicist there to inform everyone how good his client is. De La Hoya had five--seven if you include the unborn children that two of them, the Caplan sisters, are carrying--and a couple of agents. Al Gore will have less of an entourage during the Democratic Convention later in the summer at Staples Center.

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It wasn’t Mosley’s first time in the new arena. He went to the Lakers’ first game there and sat courtside as a guest of Shaquille O’Neal. Nice seat. De La Hoya also was there that night, in his own private luxury suite.

But anyone who believes Mosley will be there June 17 to serve merely as an opponent hasn’t been paying attention.

Tim Leiweke and Bobby Goldwater, whose mission it is to turn Staples Center into Madison Square Garden West, have been. They were willing to take on Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas in a bidding war to bring this fight to Los Angeles.

Los Angeles might not be the fight town it once was. But it’s still a town that embraces big events and both Leiweke and Goldwater said they believe this will be big enough to establish Staples Center as one of most important venues for boxing outside Vegas.

Mosley, who, at 28, is a year older than De La Hoya, knows it also is his chance to establish himself--worldwide, and, equally important to him, in Los Angeles.

“I wanted this fight to be in L.A.,” he said. “I think the fans in L.A. deserve to see what Sugar Shane Mosley is really about. I don’t know that they understand yet, understand how good I really am.”

Slow as he was, it could be that he’s right on time.

Randy Harvey can be reached at his e-mail address: randy.harvey@latimes.com.