Instead, the mediocre Barrios escaped with his championship for the second straight bout with a majority draw (he drew with Abel Ramos in his previous fight).
The official scores were 115-113 for Barrios and two scores of 114-114.
I scored the fight for Pacquiao 115-113 and thought he outhustled Barrios. However, Barrios took the final three rounds from a tiring Pacquiao to save his title officially and tighten the final tally on my card.
Pacquiao looked much better than I expected and said after the fight that he planned to continue his career.
It's still fair to question how much Pacquiao has left. Barrios might be the worst champion in boxing, and while a rematch makes sense after the decision, the action wasn't very memorable, and Pacquiao might be better off looking for a bigger fight.
In the co-feature, Sebastian Fundora retained his WBC junior middleweight title via TKO when the corner of Tim Tszyu stopped their bout after the seventh round.
Fundora scored a knockdown in the first round and controlled the fight, although Tszyu did better in the final rounds, scoring well in the seventh.
Tsyzu looked concussed in his corner after that round, and his corner did the right thing in calling the fight.
Fundora may attempt to regain the WBO title he was forced to give up to fight Tsyzu in a contractually obligated rematch against the winner of this weekend's Xander Zayas-Jorge Garcia bout.
Tszyu's career looks to be in big trouble and will need some rebuilding if he is ever to challenge for a title in the future.
Former WBC featherweight champion Gary Russell looked spectacular in his return from an over three-year absence with a tenth-round knockout of Hugo Castaneda at lightweight.
Russell scored knockdowns in the second and sixth rounds before ending the fight with a body blow in round ten.
I'm anxious to see how Russell fares against a better lightweight than Castaneda!
In a fight that I haven't seen, Brandon Figueroa won a unanimous decision over Joet Gonzalez by scores of 115-113 and 116-112 times two.
Boxing Challenge
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