Josh Sampo will return to competition for the first time in three years in two weeks at Bellator 197 as he will take on Dominic Mazzotta on the preliminary card of the fight card coming from The Family Arena in St. Charles, Missouri on Friday, April 13.
Bellator 197 will mark the first fight for Sampo (11-5) since dropping a decision against Justin Scoggins at UFC 197 in 2015. The defeat against Scoggins dropped Sampo to 1-3 in the UFC and he was scheduled to fight in 2016 at RFA 44. However, Sampo was forced to pull out of his fight against Matt Brown and the matchup against Mazzotta will be his first fight in 1,056 days.
During last week’s episode of “The MMA Report Podcast,” Sampo was a guest on the podcast to preview his upcoming fight at Bellator 197 against Mazzotta and during the conversation, he spoke about the layoff and being a middle school science teacher.