In 2006, Johnson turned to mixed martial arts, and he was a perfect fit for the sport, winning his first three bouts before getting a short notice call to the UFC in 2007 to face Chad Reiner, and the fight was a lot shorter than the notice, as he kicked off his career in the big show with a 13-second knockout.
Knockouts were Johnson’s calling card throughout his UFC career, whether at 170 or 205 pounds, with the likes of Yoshiyuki Yoshida, Charlie Brenneman, Rogerio Nogueira, Ryan Bader, Alexander Gustafsson, Jimi Manuwa and Glover Teixeira all falling to the humble power hitter.
So how hard did he hit? Ask his friend and longtime teammate, UFC Hall of Famer Rashad Evans.
„He hits ridiculously hard,” Evans told me in 2017. “And the thing about it that makes his punching power so unique is that it’s effortless. He’s not trying to hit hard, he’s just swinging and that’s the crazy thing about it. Sometimes we’re just going light and he’ll throw a punch and I’ll go, ‘Yo, we’re going light.’ And he’ll say, ‘I wasn’t trying to hit hard, I was just swinging.’ And he really was. But he’s got these heavy, dense bones. And when he hits you, it’s not a pain. Usually it’s like a thud, and maybe your lights will flash for a little bit. He caught me with a couple of those and I’m like, ‘Woo, we’re sparring right now, huh?’”
