It's probably no big deal, but 'War Machine' competes at UFC Fight Night 51

BRASILIA, Brazil – Saturday night’s UFC Fight Night 51 event might be flying under your radar, but there’s going to be a real familiar – and not necessarily pleasantly so – name featured on the UFC Fight Pass stream.

“These days, I’m mostly known as War Machine,” Wendell Oliveira told MMAjunkie in his native Portuguese.

If fighting with the same nickname as the troublesome UFC and Bellator vet formerly known as Jon Koppenhaver wasn’t enough, the 31-year-old Brazilian also heads up a fight team by the same moniker.

“I have my own team, War Machine, and I also belong to Gracie Barra Bangu,” Oliveira said. “I used to be in Crazy Fight Team, too, but I had to leave due to a lack of sparring partners. That’s why I set up my own team, where I have better training. It was a very fruitful change.”

Fortunately for UFC executives, Oliveira’s nickname has nothing to do with Koppenhaver-like brushes with the law, but rather a ferocious aggression inside the cage.

“I received the ‘War Machine’ nickname due to a long knockout win streak I was on, often winning in the first round,” Oliveira said. “Fight announcer and promoter Olivar Leite came up with it, after the Marvel Comics character. The new nickname stuck.”

With 18 wins in his past 19 fights, the nickname suited Oliveira just fine. Of course, when the U.S.-based “War Machine” was recently arrested for a variety of charges stemming from an alleged brutal attack of porn star and ex-girlfriend Christy Mack, Oliveira said his nickname became a bit of a hinderance.

“When everything happened, I got kind of got mixed up in it, and there were people texting and calling and asking what happened because the news came out in Brazil, but there were no pictures,” Oliveira said. “It just said, ‘War Machine,’ so people were thinking something happened. I was like, ‘I’m in Brazil, that dude is in America. I have nothing to do with that.'”

Saturday marks Oliveira’s (24-7 MMA, 0-0 UFC) UFC debut, as he steps in on one month’s notice for an injured Sergio Moraes in order to face Santiago Ponzinibbio (18-2 MMA, 0-1 UFC).

It’s a stiff test for an octagon debut but one that Oliveira relishes, especially since his fighting style varies so greatly from grappling stud Moraes.

“I think what Santiago had been training for is completely different from what I’ll be bringing when we clash,” Oliveira said. “I’m not interested in a ground war. I’ll be making sure I stay on the feet the entire time.”

So if you happen to have UFC Fight Night 51 on in the background and you hear Bruce Buffer yell out “War Machine,” there’s no need for a double-take. Koppenhaver is still incarcerated and certainly isn’t heading back to the UFC anytime soon. Instead, it’s the Brazilian “War Machine,” and despite the trouble that’s been associated with his nickname, he’s not changing it anytime soon.

“A war machine is a war machine,” Oliveira said. “I’m a ‘War Machine,’ and I don’t feel like the American ‘War Machine’ is a war machine because he wasn’t finishing fights. I finish fights, so I’m keeping the nickname.”

For more on UFC Fight Night 51, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.