They're a combined 48-8-1, together they hold wins over Dan Henderson, Kazushi Sakuraba, Alistair Overeem, Guy Mezger and Tsuyoshi Kohsaka. And soon, twin brothers Antonio Rodrigo "Minotauro" Nogueira and Antonio Rogerio "Minotoro" Nogueira will finally be back together fighting under the same banner.

"I'm excited man," Rodrigo told FiveKnuckles.com. "It excites me very much! They're still negotiating but I believe soon, by the end of the year, he will sign with the UFC. I'm pretty sure it's going to happen. It'll be like in PRIDE, we'll have the two brothers together. I had a lot of motivation to train with my brother for my fights, sometimes we fought on the same day, so it's very exciting to have my brother by my side fighting on the same show."

Rodrigo and Rogerio have trained together since both we're young boys growing up in Brazil. They've done everything together. They slapped countless submissions on one another en route to Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belts, they boxed for the Brazilian national team together. They earned law degree's and recently opened up a string of gyms together, so it was a difficult proposition when Rodrigo signed with the UFC and Rogerio went with Affliction.

"Affliction offered a better deal then UFC at the time and he's a fighter," Rodrigo said. "He's got to get the best deal for himself. We thought it was going to better to have both brothers in a different show, different TV and everything... different media's. Affliction didn't go to far though and the UFC has shown to be the best, so that's what's going to happen now. He's for sure my best training partner. I have a lot of good training partners but he's my biggest motivation. To see him signed to the UFC is one of my dreams. We're going to work very hard to make it to the top of the light heavyweight division and he will soon."

The two fought side-by-side from 2002-2007 when both competed for the vaunted, though now defunct, PRIDE promotion. Rodrigo believes that having his brother fight with him in the UFC will ultimately help him come fight night.

"One of my greatest memories is when we walk together to the locker room and I feel a lot of support," Rodrigo said. "When you have your friends there, when you have your team there, when you have your brother on board, it's so much different. We do the same team together, we train for the fight in the same day, and to have him involved is much better than the normal way. And we are twins, we're close, so it's very exciting."

So how does his brother stack up in what many consider the sports' strongest division?

"The UFC's lightweight division is very busy," Rodrigo said. "It's always been the strongest weight, the UFC 205. It's the best division. So he's going to war right now. We got Lyoto, Shogun; their fight in 2005 was the best fight, that fight was amazing. He's gonna face a lot of good opponents and he'll be ready for it. He's in very good shape right now. His boxing skills are great, his hands have always been very good. His wrestling is getting very good and his jiu-jitsu, he doesn't have to prove anything. He's very good. This is happening at the right time for him. He's fought for Affliction, he's fought in Japan and now he's coming to UFC.

Rogerio "Minotouro" Nogueira will be joining his good friends and training partners