Dan Hooker was supposed to fight Bobby Green in the co-main event of UFC Fight Night Austin, but was forced to pull out of the card due to an arm injury.
The fighter says the injury occurred while blocking a kick during a sparring session.
“Sparring yesterday, blocked a bit of a kick, went in for an X-ray, she’s custered,” Hooker told Submission Radio (transcript via Drake Riggs of MMA Fighting). “Just broke in the same place. It kind of is what it is. I took a risk. I obviously was coming back a little quicker than ... yeah, it’s all on me, brother. I rushed to come back. I wanted to fight and I knew the risk of coming back that quickly and we rolled the dice, we come up snake eyes, baby.”
Nobody has stepped up yet on short notice to fight Green at the event, which is scheduled for December 2.
Hooker, who will be in recovery mode for the near future, also doesn’t expect Green to sit around and wait for him to get better.
“You can’t expect anyone to wait around in this sport,” Hooker said. “When you’re injured, you can’t call your shots. When you’re healthy, you can get out there and start naming names, which I’m not shy about, but now I’m like, he’s obviously gonna fight someone else and move on with wherever he’s going. We’ll reassess it in a couple of months when I’m back training at 100 percent.”