Michael Chandler Stops Dan Hooker Early In Promotional Debut At UFC 257

The UFC hosts their third event in just one week for their third stint on Fight Island tonight, as UFC 257 goes down live on pay-per-view from the Etihad Arena, in Abu Dhabi, Untied Arab Emirates.

Headlining the event will be an epic lightweight rematch, featuring the return of ‘The Notorious’, Conor McGregor, who will be facing No. 2 ranked Dustin ‘The Diamond’ Poirier in the main event of the evening.

Their first bout took place at featherweight back in September of 2014, with McGregor winning via TKO at 1:46 of round one. Can ‘The Diamond’ avenge his most bitter defeat to date tonight?

Co-headlining the card will also be a lightweight bout, this one between No. 6 ranked Dan ‘The Hangman’ Hooker and former six-time Bellator lightweight champion ‘Iron’ Michael Chandler. This is of course the bout we will be recapping today in this piece.

Hooker is coming off a unanimous decision defeat to Dustin Poirier in a 2020 Fight of the Year candidate, after initially going 7-1 once moving up to 155 lbs, while Chandler is coming off back-to-back first-round KO victories over Sidney Outlaw and former WEC & UFC lightweight champion Benson Henderson.

We’ve all been waiting nearly a decade to see Chandler fight the very best in the world, and it finally happened tonight! Continue reading to see how this incredible bout went down:

Round 1

Chandler takes the center of the octagon once the fight starts, but doesn’t throw anything early on. Hooker opens up with some leg kicks, before Chandler lands a right cross to the body about 70 seconds in.

Chandler landed a nice overhand right shortly afterward, but Hooker remained unfazed and returned with a hard calf kick, making Chandler limp a little. We could definitely tell that one hurt.

Chandler then lunges in and throws a nasty left hook, dropping Hooker, before reigning down some more ground-and-pound to get the stoppage midway through the round. Man, what a UFC debut! This was long awaited and he certainly delivered against one of the very best in the world.

Official Result: Michael Chandler def. Dan Hooker via TKO (punches) at 2:30 of round one

Brady Ordway

I became a fan of combat sports when I was 12 years old. I was scrolling through the channels and landed upon Versus, where WEC was televised. Urijah Faber fought Jens Pulver for the second time that night. That's the first fight I ever saw, and I was immediately hooked. So eventually, I began covering the sport in the fourth quarter of 2018, and have since started writing about animals as well. If you'd like to see those pieces, be sure to check out learnaboutnature.com!

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