A intriguing middleweight bout between Vitor Belfort (20-9 MMA, 9-4 UFC) and former welterweight Anthony Johnson (10-3 MMA, 7-3 UFC) will be part of January's UFC 142 card.
UFC officials today announced that verbal agreements are in place for the fight.
UFC 142 takes place Jan. 14 in Brazil, and Belfort vs. Johnson will be part of a main card expected to air on pay-per-view.
Although UFC officials haven't announced exact details, event sources told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) it'll likely be held at Rio de Janeiro's HSBC Arena, which also hosted UFC 134 in August.
Recent reports suggested Belfort and UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva were slated to coach an upcoming Brazilian edition of "The Ultimate Fighter," though UFC officials shot down the rumors on Monday when contacted by MMAjunkie.com.
Belfort had been scheduled to fight Cung Le in the co-headliner of this month's UFC 139 event but eventually was forced off the card due to injury. Belfort recently rebounded from a vicious KO title loss to champ Anderson Silva with a dominant victory over Yoshihiro Akiyama at UFC 133. Belfort, who's now won six of his past seven fights, scored a "Knockout of the Night" award with the Akiyama victory. In fact, his past four victories (and nine of his past 10) have all come via knockout.
Johnson, who recently hasn't had trouble with his weight despite some slip-ups early in his UFC career, nonetheless will move up a weight class, and he'll do so on the strength of a 5-1 run that included a recent head-kick KO of Charlie Brenneman at UFC on Versus 6. Johnson was deep in welterweight title contention but now will test the waters at middleweight.
Source: Vitor Belfort vs. Anthony Johnson slated for UFC 142 in Brazil