"Now Sugar Shane Mosley has the opportunity that he wanted come May 1...And he will win," stated Bernard Hopkins just one month prior to Shane Mosley's disappointing loss to Floyd Mayweather this past weekend. Although the fight didn't turn out as predicted, Hopkins does deserve credit for playing a pivotal role in stirring the pot between the two fighters. Back in September of 2009, he urged Mosley to instigate a post-fight confrontation shortly after Mayweather had just defeated Juan Manuel Marquez. It was a bold move for the normally polite Mosley, but with Hopkins at his side lobbing his own insults, he succeeded in getting under the skin of Mayweather. Ironically, however, when it came time for Mosley to actually step into the ring with Mayweather on May 1, Bernard Hopkins, the man who once appeared to have Mosley's back, was nowhere to be found.
Not too long ago, Hopkins took great pride in the advice he gave to Mosley as he tried to help his fellow Golden Boy Promotions "partner" secure a mega-fight. "I made that happen in that ring with Shane Mosley. Everybody knew it and it was no big deal," Hopkins would explain in an interview with FightHype.com late last year. "What happened in that ring after the fight was over, see, Shane Mosley's personality is a little different than mine. I went street and I went gangsta and I threw a little corporate in there and I did what a promoter's supposed to do. I shoved Shane in the middle and said, 'Come on dawg!'"
The question is, after going through so much trouble to help out a few months ago, where was Bernard's support when Shane Mosley, as well as Bernard's own trainer, Naazim Richardson, were getting ready to face perhaps the toughest challenge in both of their careers? "Oh, he's here, but you know he's not trying to come down and get caught in all of this mess," commented a member of Team Hopkins, who we happened to run into early Saturday morning. Despite his assurance of Bernard's presence, however, the 45-year-old fighter was missing in action from all of the Fight Week activities.
Take the weigh-in, for example, where a number of past and present champions were in attendance to add to the pageantry of the event. Fighters on hand included Tommy Hearns, Juan Manuel Marquez, Joe Calzaghe, Andre Berto, Ricky Hatton, Marco Antonio Barrera and Sergio Mora, but Hopkins, who's become somewhat of a permanent fixture at all of Golden Boy's weigh-ins, was noticeably absent. It seems odd that he would be missing from the festivities surrounding his own company's biggest event of the year. In fact, Hopkins, once eager to share the ring with both Mayweather and Mosley, wasn't seen at all this time around after the fight as both fighters conducted their post-fight interviews with Larry Merchant. The same holds true for the post-fight press conference, where again, Hopkins was a no-show.
So inquiring minds want to know exactly what's going on with Bernard Hopkins? Has his rift with Golden Boy Promotions grown so wide that he's turned his back on his friend and fellow partner? Did something happen between he and Shane that prompted him to pass on attending a fight that he feels partially responsible for making? Perhaps he really was there, but was just too embarrassed to show his face in Vegas after his dreadful pay-per-view bust against Roy Jones Jr. at the Mandalay Bay Casino just one month prior. Regardless of the reason why he was so hard to find, I always taught to finish whatever I start, so in my opinion, Bernard Hopkins should have been front and center supporting both Shane Mosley and Naazim Richardson in the activities leading up to and after the fight.
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