Las Vegas, NV (BoxingGurus.com) - Marco Antonio Barrera, using great defense and boxing skills, out-worked and out-boxed "Prince" Naseem Hamed throughout most of their match Saturday night. The fight was a close, but clearly decisive, unanimous decision for Barrera over the Prince, with the judges scoring 115-112, 116-111, and 115-112. We at BoxingGurus.com agreed with the judges with a 114-113 (7 rounds to 5) advantage for Barrera. Barrera was a 3-1 underdog as he entered the ring at the packed MGM Grand Casino with 12, 847 fight fans in attendance.

Barrera (53-3-0-1, 38 KO) kept Hamed away from him most of the fight, never really letting the Prince get inside and get off any power punches. Barrera used his very solid left jab to keep Hamed at bay, snapping Hamed's neck back many times.

Hamed (35-1, 31 KO) seemed tentative from the beginning of the night as the fight was pushed back almost an hour because of Hamed having glove problems. He needed to rewrap his hands 2-3 different times before finally making his showy entrance. Hamed, who came into the ring by flying in a on a swing of some kind, finally got to the ring for this very much anticipated Featherweight showdown.

Barrera connects.   (AP)

Barrera used a conservative strategy by staying outside and out-boxing Hamed, who just did not throw enough punches. Hamed appeared tentative in the ring and just never looked confident enough to catch Barrera with his power shots. "I wasn't too comfortable throwing my left hand," Hamed said after the fight. ""He was the pure winner of this fight," the humbled Hamed said. "The guy fought better than I did, and that's it, plain and simple."

There were no knockdowns throughout the fight, but Hamed was caught off balance a few different times and appeared to be hurt, but never is any serious trouble. Barrera got a point taken away in the 12th round for being very rough with Hamed and throwing him in to the corner.

Hamed also stated after the fight that he has a rematch clause in the fight contract that he will use after a fight to get his game back in order. He is looking for the rematch to take place around the end of the year.

Hamed made $6 million for this IBO Featherweight Championship match, while Barrera only made just over $1 million.

On the undercard, U.S. Olympic bronze-medal winners Jermain Taylor and Clarence Vinson both won their four-rounders. Taylor (2-0, 2 KO) stopped Kenny Stubbs at 3:28 of the second round of their middleweight match. Vinson (2-0) won his second by decision, out-pointing Bryan Garcia in their bantamweight bout.

Michael Bennett (3-0, 3 KO), the 2000 amateur world champion, stopped Billy Zumbrun at 2:49 of the first round in their heavyweight bout also scheduled for four rounds.

In a super middleweight match scheduled for 10 rounds, Omar Sheika stopped Stephan Ouellet at 1:46 of the second round.