The steroid thing will never stop dogging Shane Mosley if he keeps answering questions about it.

Mosley became angry when a reporter brought up the issue on a conference call Tuesday, a few days after a video of his deposition admitting he took performance-enhancing drugs in 2003 was leaked by Victor Conte of BALCO.

“I never did that stuff,” said Mosley, who faces Floyd Mayweather Jr. on May 1 in Las Vegas. “I never was on it really like that. I've always been a clean fighter.”

The New York Daily News called him on that statement, writing that he directly contradicted his earlier admission. Technically, the newspaper was right in doing so.

However, I don’t think Mosley would actually claim he was a clean athlete knowing his admission is on record. I think he is simply sticking to his story that he didn’t know beforehand what he was taking and that he has been clean before and since.

I’ve never believed that Mosley didn’t know – just as I don’t believe Antonio Margarito didn’t know about his illegal handwraps – but we’ve been over this ad nauseum. I was ready to move on.

Mosley’s mistake was answering the question at all. All he had to say was: “I’m done talking about that. Next question.”

Instead he became frustrated and couldn’t resist counter punching.

“It's ridiculous now that the media wants to make me the poster boy of steroids,” Mosley said. “If you guys want to continue to put that out there, so be it. You guys know the truth.”

That’s the problem. We do know the truth: Mosley admitted to taking PEDs, although no one is saying he still does.

WBA title not at stake: Richard Schaefer of Golden Boy Promotions, Mosley’s promoter, said that only Mosley will be fighting for his WBA welterweight title. Mayweather reportedly didn’t pay the sanctioning body’s fees.

I guess that means that Mosley can lose the belt, which would make the title vacant, but Mayweather can’t win it. It's not clear, though.

“I don't know what to think about that,” said Mosley, referring to his opponent's refusal to pay the fee. “Everybody grows up wanting to fight for a belt and wanting to be a world champion. For him to dismiss it like, 'Oh, I'm bigger than this belt,' that just doesn't seem like he's in this sport for the sport. He's in it just for the money. Which is good, I mean, if he's in it for the money, to each his own.

“I love the glory and the legendary status of being a champion and winning belts, and beating the best guys out there. If you do that, then, the money's going to come regardless.”

I support Mayweather on this. Schaefer said “the two best fighters are fighting each other. That's what's at stake here.”

And that's all that matters.