Dan Hooker beat Claudio Puelles in impressive fashion in his most recent UFC appearance. Photo / Getty Images
Dan Hooker beat Claudio Puelles in impressive fashion in his most recent UFC appearance. Photo / Getty Images
Heading into his 10th year with the UFC, Dan Hooker isn’t done evolving.
With freshly dyed white blonde hair and newly inked tattoos on his back and legs, Hooker will look like a new man when he steps into the octagon against Jalin Turner at UFC 290 on Sunday, butit’s the changes you can’t see that have the Kiwi lightweight excited.
“The day you stop evolving in this sport is a very bad day,” Hooker tells the Herald. “This game is constantly evolving. You can look at mixed martial arts and you can look at the way the teams and the best gyms in the world approach it. That’s something that’s constantly in evolution, that’s constantly in motion.
“You can’t just sit on those laurels forever. Nothing is infinite in this sport, it’s constantly in flow and in motion, so you have to keep up with the time.”
Hooker’s bout against Turner will be his first outing of 2023 after having to withdraw from a previous booking against the American earlier in the year with a broken hand. The bout had a momentary cloud over it at weigh-ins on Saturday morning. While Hooker tipped the scales at 155.5lbs (70.5kg), however, Turner came in two pounds (about 1kg) above the 156lbs limit for a lightweight non-title fight. A fighter missing weight can lead to the bout being cancelled, however Hooker elected to take the fight at a catchweight and Turner will forfeit 20 per cent of his purse for the fight.
It’s a chance for Hooker to build upon his impressive second-round TKO win over Claudio Puelles last November, although he faces a much tougher assignment in Turner – who sits at No 11 in the rankings, one spot above Hooker.
The win over Puelles halted a rough skid for Hooker, who had lost four of his five previous bouts – all against opponents ranked in the top five of their divisions. Heading into that bout, questions were being raised as to where the Kiwi veteran sat in the division, but he answered those in emphatic fashion.
Or so it seemed. While recovering from his hand injury, he messaged his manager about trying to book a matchup against a top contender who had just recently fought for his return to action.
Not so long ago, Dan Hooker squaring off against Tony Ferguson would have been a bout that could headline a card. But Ferguson has fallen away in recent years; his last win was more than four years ago and he has long dropped out of the rankings.
Jalin Turner and Dan Hooker will square off on the main card at UFC 290 in Las Vegas on Sunday. Photo / Getty Images
The fight might still be one that sells on name value alone, but name value isn’t what gets Hooker out of bed in the morning.
“I didn’t even respond to the message to my management. That was my physical response, that wasn’t something I had to think about. Like, I read that and I was just like, fire. It lit a fire under my ass.
“I want to be a contender, I want to be competing against guys at the top, I want to fight the prospects, I want to fight the guys that people don’t want to fight, that’s what motivates me to do this sport, not big money and things like that. I want to work my way towards the best guys in the world.”
He gets his wish in Turner – a man who has needed fewer than two full rounds to get the job done in five of his last six fights. The winner likely faces off against an opponent in the top 10 next.
It shapes up as a fan-friendly encounter and one capable of stealing fight of the night honours. Both Hooker and Turner are well-rounded mixed martial artists with the skills to be effective in every aspect. That shows in their finishing records, with 31 of their combined 35 career wins coming by stoppage.
“I’m just excited to get out there and test my skills against Jalin. Whatever comes with that comes with that, but it’s an incredibly exciting opportunity,” Hooker says.
“I got asked today ‘are you looking for a finish in this fight?’ and it’s like, ‘mate, I’m always looking for a finish.’ That is predominantly what I’m focusing on.
“Even if I take someone down, it’s because I’m looking for a finish. If I’m stalling them out, it’s because I’m setting up a finish later on. If it looks boring, it’s because I am trying to switch that man off a little later on in the play, a little later on in the fight. Be patient.”
