Dan Hooker will be eager to clinch a victory in his home country in front of home support at UFC Fight Night 110 Auckland on June 10th. However, Ross Pearson may have a thing or two to say about that. If Hooker wants a home win, he will have to beat Pearson and that is no walk in the park.
Hooker’s record has been anything but constant. He has had good times and bad alike in the Octagon. Coming to recent form, Hooker has been impressive and has only lost to Yair Rodriguez and Jason Knight. Rodriguez and Knight are fighters who are both exceptional and probably the best the featherweight division has seen in a very long time. However, Hooker isn’t fighting in the featherweight division anymore, he has bulked up to make an upward move to the lightweight division. The lightweight division is weight class which Pearson has been competing in for a very long time and hence has a ton of experience under his belt. Pearson relies mostly on his boxing skills and strikes relentlessly to knock out opponents while he also utilizes counter wrestling techniques to ward off any attempts made by opponents to take the fight to the floor.
When it comes to strikes absorbed per minutes, Pearson is statistically proven to be better than his opponent, Hooker. However, Hooker does have an advantage in terms of reach. Hooker is also quicker and more agile, but he has not been able to tap into his agility to really make it count so far.
All in all, this is a very well matched fight which really could swing either way. There is no concrete favorite as such.
Prediction – Fight to go to judges, Pearson to win by Unanimous Decision.