If you’re given the name Volkan, anything other than a career as a ruthless, uncompromising warrior might underwhelm.
Volkan the lawyer, the salesman, Volkan from IT. None quite ring true.
But Volkan the UFC light-heavyweight champion of the world… that fits rather better.
Volkan Oezdemir (left) has risen rapidly and has a title shot on Saturday against Daniel Cormier
The name conjures images of earth-shuddering strikes, Volkanic if you like, and Oezdemir cannot be questioned on that front.
From relative obscurity to a title shot in within a year, the man with the moniker ‘No Time’ hasn’t wasted a second.
Now only wily wrestling veteran Daniel Cormier stands in the way of Oezdemir becoming the first Swiss champion in the UFC, a historic milestone for a country known more for the balletic grace of Roger Federer, watchmaking and chocolate.
‘It would be amazing to leave a mark on history like that,’ Oezdemir exclusively told Sportsmail.
‘The MMA scene will grow bigger, we’ll have more fighters coming out of Switzerland, more fight schools and also more presence in the media so it will be a really good experience for my country.
‘I guess Roger Federer is still gonna be way bigger than me! But UFC is still growing in my country and a lot of people have started knowing about it and watching it.’
The 28-year-old has won three fights in less than one year in the UFC since last February
Three fights in the UFC. Three victories and a title shot against Daniel Cormier at UFC 220 on Saturday, it all seems a bit too easy for the man from Fribourg.
But Oezdemir’s journey to this weekend’s showpiece has been anything but straightforward.
The 28-year-old once put himself through five gruelling training camps only for his scheduled opponent to pull out at the eleventh hour each time. Nobody would fight him.
Oezdemir was on the brink of an early retirement, convinced the stars would never align for him. Then the UFC came calling, chasing a late notice replacement to fight Ovince St Preux in Texas. He didn’t need a second invitation and hasn’t lost since.
Oezdemir insists he has the all-round game to trouble Cormier, not just heavy hands
Outside of the octagon however, the waters have been decidedly choppier. He was involved in a bar fight in August and charged a third degree felony, battery with great bodily harm.
Oezdemir plead not guilty but as distractions go, the ongoing court proceedings seem a significant one ahead of his greatest challenge to date.
‘It wasn’t really present in my mind during camp,’ insists Oezdemir.
‘The stuff was handled by professionals so I was able to train full time and that was it,’ he says as if confused by the idea that anything could shatter his unbreakable focus.
Oezdemir is on such an even keel, so unflappable in the often chaotic world of elite MMA that even Cormier’s dismissal of him as just another heavy-handed slugger is swatted away with reason and logic, rather than the customary trash-talking riposte. The champion had labelled him a poor version of Anthony ‘Rumble’ Johnson.
‘He thinks I am the same but we have completely different styles of striking and I also have a good jiu-jitsu background.
‘I’ve been practising jiut-jitsu in competition for a while. I’m definitely going to be a different challenge.
Oezdemir made his UFC debut against Ovince St Preux and won by decision
‘I also come here with the same heavy hands but I can knock people out in a different style. I don’t need a lot of reach to knock people out. I can knock people out in close range and at different angles so it’s going to be a dangerous fight for him.’
‘It’s definitely going to end up in close range because at the end of the day he is a wrestler, he might start striking but to be effective he will have to be at close range. I’m going to have both long distance and close range, so I will have all the tools.’
Former UFC middleweight champion Luke Rockhold, a former team member of Cormier’s has been training in Florida with Oezdemir, usually a no-no in the run up to a big fight. The ensuing media storm offered another disturbance to his preparations.
Cormier had quipped: ‘What’s Luke going to teach him? He can’t even beat me!’
But Oezdemir explains that the furore erupting around Rockhold’s supposed treachery is overblown.
‘So Luke trained in Florida already before my first UFC fight, he never really stayed there, he was there a few weeks and then he left for California. We have a good relationship as team-mates, we’ve trained together a few times.
‘But now that I’m fighting Cormier, of course we’re sharing the mat, we’re not really training together. We’re doing conditioning or warm-ups by the side, so it’s really a professional environment and Luke is really respectful.
Oezdemir (right) comes in as the heavy underdog against the veteran wrestler
The Swiss fighter dispatched highly-rated Jimi Manuwa (left) with a first round knockout
’I’m not going to be asking any insider information from him because I know what it is like to be in this situation. Luke is looking for the best for himself by switching camp, it was already a long process and took him more than a year to do that.’
Having overcome St Preux, Oezdemir eviscerated elite-level contenders Misha Cirkunov and Jimi Manuwa with first round knockouts but Cormier, a former Olympian, represents another step up in class.
‘He is definitely going to be my toughest opponent but at the same time I don’t really think about it. Okay it is over five rounds for the championship but I definitely come into the fight with the same mentality.
‘I’m not looking at anybody with fear. I’m not looking at opponents with different kinds of emotions. I’m staying stone cold.’
‘Stone cold’ just about sums Oezdemir up. He’s as surgically considered with his words as with he is with his fists.
An 11/4 underdog, that level head may be rocked like never before by Cormier but the challenger has no room for odds and no time for doubt.
‘I need to go with what I do best. It’s a knockout in the first round.’
Watch UFC 220: Miocic vs. Ngannou live on BT Sport 2 from 1am GMT early on Sunday, January 21, or catch the Early Prelims exclusively on UFC Fight Pass from 11:30pm GMT on Saturday