Three Bouts Added to RAF 09 Card

With just over a month remaining until Real American Freestyle’s RAF 09 card, the organization made a trio of new match announcements on Tuesday to help fill out its card.

The matches are as follows: Arman Tsarukyan vs. Mugzy Bulljunk (middleweight - 175 lbs), Parker Keckeisen vs. Georgio Kougioumtsidis (cruiserweight - 190 lbs), and Ridge Lovett vs. Bajrang Punia (lightweight - 155 lbs).

Tsarukyan has been the biggest mainstream star from the first eight RAF cards. He’s 4-0 in the organization with wins over Lance Palmer, Georgio Poullas (x2), and Urijah Faber. Tsarukyan has garnered the attention of non-wrestling fans during his post-match brawl against Poullas and their subsequent rematch, as well as for running Faber off the stage at RAF 08. The matchup with Mugzy doesn’t really align with typical matchmaking practices, as he’s 1-2 with RAF. Both losses have come via tech and one of them was to Poullas.

The other two matches are interesting for the wrestling diehards and feature a young American star against an exciting foreign opponent.

Keckeisen just fell to Kyle Dake in the 86 kg US Open finals. Since Dake will move on to Final X against Zahid Valencia, the 2026 world team is out of the picture for Keckeisen. We might see him on multiple cards over the next few months. Keckeisen also lost to Dake in RAF, but famously debuted with a surprising 10-2 victory over the returning world champion Valencia.

Opposing Keckeisen is another 2025 world champion, Kougioumtsidis. The Greek star won his world title at 79 kg, beating Levi Haines 3-2 in the gold medal matchup. That marked Kougioumtsidis’ first world medal; however, he’s been in the mix during the previous tournaments. Kougioumtsidis lost in a bronze medal match in 2023 and was seventh in 2021.

The other matchup features Lovett making his RAF debut. The 2025 NCAA champion secured a berth in Final X on Saturday evening after a wild 14-12 victory over his NCAA finals opponent, Caleb Henson. Lovett will wait for a Final X opponent to emerge from the World Team Trials. Lovett didn’t compete internationally much during his collegiate career at Nebraska; however, he did enter the Albanian Ranking Series event earlier this year.

Lovett will take on the Indian star Punia. Punia, better known by his first name Bajrang, took part in RAF’s debut show, where he fell 5-1 to Yianni Diakomihalis. Bajrang was a bronze medalist at the 2020 Olympic Games and earned four Senior world medals between 2013-2022. He is also an eight-time Asian medalist, with two of those being gold medals.

In addition, RAF’s social media posting stated that the winner of Lovett/Punia gets a shot at the lightweight title. Since Diakomihalis has been dealing with injuries and another contender, Austin Gomez, retired, the belt has been vacant. With another high-profile lightweight bout on the card (Zain Retherford vs. Elnazar Akhmataliev), you have to wonder if the winners will clash for the championship.

With these three matches on tap, RAF 09 now has ten matches that have been announced publicly. They typically have 12. The main event on this card features the RAF debut of Gable Steveson. He’ll take on Moldovan heavyweight Alexandr Romanov.

Here is the current card as of Wednesday morning:

Heavyweight (UNL): Gable Steveson vs. Alexsandr Romanov

Catchweight: Colby Covington vs. Chris Weidman

Light Heavyweight Championship (215 lbs): Kyle Snyder vs. Givi Matcharashvili

Women’s Middleweight Championship (150 lbs): Kennedy Blades vs. Alexis Gomez

Lightweight (155 lbs): Zain Retherford vs. Elnazar Akhmataliev

Women’s Catchweight: Lucia Guzman Yepez vs. Cam Guerin

Lightweight (155 lbs): Merab Dvalishvili vs. Frankie Edgar

Middleweight (175 lbs): Arman Tsarukyan vs. Mugzy Bulljunk

Cruiserweight (190 lbs): Parker Keckeisen vs. Georgio Kougioumtsidis 

Lightweight (155 lbs): Ridge Lovett vs. Bajrang Punia