Lavar Johnson was on pace to have a 2010 Chris Leben-like resurgence. He knocked out Joey Beltran in his UFC debut. He followed this up with a first-round TKO of Pat Barry. Then, he got called in to take on Stefan Struve after Mark Hunt withdrew from UFC 146 with a knee injury.
He was in position to put together a three-fight win streak, something that almost no fighters in the UFC’s heavyweight division have right now.
He was in position to claim a spot on top-10 heavyweight lists.
He was in position to make his back-to-back losses to Shane del Rosario and Shawn Jordan in Strikeforce a distant memory.
Then he got caught by an awkward Stefan Struve armbar only a minute into the fight. This is an undeniably harsh change for somebody that had rocketing stock, and could have had one of the best single years for a fighter, ever.
Now that Lavar Johnson has been slapped back into reality, the question then turns to who should he try and make a comeback against? There are a few good options available for him at this time.