RIO DE JANEIRO \u2014 Valter Walker was left heartbroken when the UFC called him on Thursday to inform that Mohammed Usman was out of their upcoming clash at UFC Rio on Oct. 11. He\u2019s now hoping to get back in the cage as early as Oct. 25, when UFC 321 lands in Abu Dhabi.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst moment I was very upset. I get emotional, I cry,\u201d Walker told MMA Fighting. \u201cBut if I have faith, maybe this is for something bigger. \u2026 But I\u2019m happy I\u2019m gonna fight after two weeks. [UFC matchmaker] Mick [Maynard] tell me like I\u2019m gonna have something about my expenses, because I spent so much money bringing my wife, bringing my two coaches here. I\u2019m gonna have like some kind of help from UFC and after two weeks, I\u2019m gonna have a fight in Abu Dhabi. If this happens, it\u2019s gonna be great. If not, I\u2019m be happy as well fighting in December.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s still unclear what forced Usman out of the card, and Walker said he was not given a reason.<\/p>\n
\u201cI try don\u2019t talk too much about that because we have like same manager, I respect this guy\u2019s brother,\u201d Walker said. \u201cI\u2019m a little bit upset with him, but I respect his family name, you know? I respect Kamaru Usman because [he\u2019s] ex-champion, and won\u2019t go inside any kind of conflict in respect to Ali Abdelaziz, in respect to his brother.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Brazilian heavyweight said he was offered a name to be his opponent later this month at UFC 321, but is still waiting for the bout agreement to make things official. Even if the deal isn\u2019t done in time, he hopes to be back in action before the end of the year. Walker said he was compensated by the UFC despite the fight cancellation but he\u2019s still upset that the match if off because \u201cI\u2019m not here for money, I\u2019m not a prostitute.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m waiting the contract, but I already like change all my plans,\u201d Walker said. \u201cI was planning to stay here one more week with my family and now my manager changed my ticket back to Moscow on Monday. I\u2019ll already come back training. If it happens in two weeks, I\u2019m ready. If it happens after one month, I\u2019m ready. I\u2019m ready every time. I don\u2019t make training camp, I\u2019m all the time in shape.\u201d<\/p>\n
Riding a three-fight winning streak in the UFC with all three finishes coming by way of heel hook, Walker blasted fellow heavyweights who took on social media to offer to step in when news broke of Usman was out, but allegedly changed the tone when offered by the UFC.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis makes me stressed,\u201d Walker said. \u201cI\u2019m very angry because my fight was canceled. I\u2019m not joking, I come here for work. I come here for making money. I come here for making history. If I go inside the cage and make a hook hook No. 4 I\u2019m gonna be in the history. I come here not for joking, I come here for making history. I joke all the time in social media and people think like all the time I\u2019m joking. No, bro, I\u2019m trying to promote my fight, promote my name. It\u2019s my work. Sometimes people don\u2019t understand what is going on and think everything is a joke. If you talk, you need to do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RIO DE JANEIRO \u2014 Valter Walker was left heartbroken when the UFC called him on Thursday to inform…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208030,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,701,638,82,640,702],"class_list":{"0":"post-208029","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-latest-news","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc","15":"tag-ufc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}