Alistair Overeem will return to the Octagon when he meets fellow heavyweight veteran Alexey Oleynik on April 20 at UFC St. Petersburg. And considering that the two men share over four decades of combined MMA experience, it’s unsurprising that the short-notice matchup won’t mark the first time their paths have crossed.
“Alexey and I, we have a little bit of history,” Overeem explained Monday on The MMA Hour. “We’re actually okay together, we’re friends. I like him a lot. I helped him on his Cro Cop several years ago, 2013, and then he helped me for the Frank Mir fight (in 2014 at UFC 169).