A couple of bouts surfaced on Wednesday for the upcoming UFC on Versus 4 event featuring a middleweight bout between Nate “The Great” Marquardt (31-10-2) vs. Anthony “Rumble” Johnson (9-3), as well as a welterweight contest featuring Martin “The Hitman” Kampmann (17-5) vs. John “Doomsday” Howard (14-6).
While the Marquardt vs. Johnson bout was first identified by Ariel Helwani at Versus.com, noting that both men would be expected to headline the fourth UFC event on Versus.
UFC President Dana White announced the Kampmann vs. Howard bout “Verbal agreements are in for a battle between two of the best strikers in the welterweight division as John “Doomsday” Howard takes on Martin “The Hitman” Kampmann.”
“Anthony Johnson has always been one of the largest welterweights in the UFC but now former top middleweight contender Nate Marquardt will drop down and attempt a run at the welterweight title,” said UFC President Dana White. “Both of these guys are powerful strikers and grapplers and it should be a great fight.”
UFC on Versus 4 is scheduled to take place on June 26 at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Penn., with the main card airing live on the Versus network in the U.S. and on Rogers Sportsnet in Canada.
Marquardt is 2-1 in his last three fights, earning a unanimous decision against last minute replacement Dan Miller at the UFC 128 event last month in Newark, NJ. The win erased a #1 contender loss to Yushin Okami at UFC 122, it was the second title eliminator loss of his career. Johnson, meanwhile, returned to the octagon after a year-and-a-half layoff to defeat Dan Hardy at UFN 24 just a few weeks ago on March 26. The win put him back in the winning circle after a loss to Josh Koscheck back in November of 2009, a submission loss at the UFC 106 event.
Kampmann has lost his last two bouts, but is coming off a $160,000 “Fight of the Night” bonus awarded to him and opponent Diego Sanchez at the last Versus show in early March. He lost a unanimous decision to “The Dream” which followed a split decision loss to Jake Shields at UFC 121. His opponent, “Doomsday” Howard also enters the fight on back-to-back losses and will be looking for a victory. His last octagon appearance was in December at UFC 124, a unanimous decision loss to Thiago Silva. Previous to that he suffered a TKO (doctor stoppage) loss to Jake Ellenberger after his left eye swelled shut.