Marco Antonio Barrera vs Prince Naseem Hamed

I re-watched this fight again last night & I just have to say, despite never having being Barrera`s biggest fan, what a brilliant performance, a true masterclass only possible by a genuinely great fighter.

Make no mistake, Naseem was ready & IMO actually fought quite well, the first half of the fight was quite close, though Barrera still won his rounds clearer. It was in the second half of the fight though that separated both men, both on the night & in history.

Naz had arguably his best round in round 7 it looked as if he was finally starting to crack the iron will of Barrera & this would go the same route as so many Hamed fights were his freakish power is just too much for 126 lb men to handle, but no, Marco stepped it up and took all of the remaining rounds, only round 10 being arguable for Naz. It was in rounds 11 & 12 though when Naz needed the knockout that Barrera turned it on, he out-thought, out-boxed & out-punched the Prince leaving absolutely no doubt about who was the better man.

Forget the head ramming into ring post thing, I`m in the minority of thinking it was unnecessary & very stupid for a guy of Marco`s intelligence to do, he could have thrown his biggest night away by being DQ`d, thankfully (yes I said it) he wasn`t & got his deserved win.

Barrera was never my favourite fighter, I was & still am a Morales man, but this fight for me was Barrera`s signature performance (outside of the Morales fights obviously), he was brilliant, Barrera at his best.

 

You sure can

 

Rose boxed superbly vs Harada, I preferred what MAB did vs Naz myself but no doubt if your in the mood to watch a good fighter get soundly beaten then you can`t go wrong with either fight.

 

It put icing on the cake but was very silly, MAB came into the fight having spent the last year complaining about being cheated out of his biggest victory (Morales 1) and here with the fight in the bag vs Naz he gave them all the ammunition they needed to rip it away from him, and the weird thing is there was no foul play or bad feeling leading up to it to make Barrera respond this way, they did have a wrestle in round 2 but Naz was quick to touch gloves & from then on they boxed a fair & decent fight, I found it odd & surprising when Barrera did it, personally..... but it never cost him so all ended well.

:good

 

I haven`t heard of anything that was said between either guy, I do remember in an interview before the fight Barrera said something along the lines of `I hear Hamed always going on about Allah, Allah, well I am a catholic & (something else I can`t remember) but Allah will not be in the ring with him, it will only be him and me`

I don`t see Barrera as being so religious that he disliked Hamed for being a muslim & talking about Allah, he`s a smart guy, doubt he`d give a **** about another fighters beliefs so I doubt its that... maybe just a spur of the moment thing by Barrera, who knows ?