High stakes events (NCAAs) vs one-offs (RAF)

[WrestlingPhD]

It seems most wrestling fans and sports fans as a whole are most interested and excited in high stakes and built up events like NCAA D1 wrestling championships, with the tournament being only once a year and the typical four years of eligibility only to compete. Also, the Olympics occurring only once every four years.
 

On the other hand there are the many one off, low stakes matches that RAF has been doing. I want to but just can’t seem to get excited about some of these low stakes, one off matches in RAF

Do others feel the same?

[jmoney]

Interesting question...for me you get a LOT for your time and money with NCAAs and B1G tourney- you know what you're getting. When you want to launch some niche sporting card event, it's helpful to centralize it some place where people can reliably access it. For boxing it was HBO and Showtime doing a good job reliably producing events for a long time. UFC did a pretty good job of this also. I'm not as much of a UFC fan as I was boxing so can't completely speak to this. I think wrestling will struggle with not offering this on Netflix. That's like the modern day HBO- a streaming site nearly everyone has.

I stopped being a boxing fan because these 1 time events were either mis-judged, a guy fought injured or didn't train for it, and the Arum De La Hoya feud ruined boxing exhausting my favorite fighters' careers and we never got a Manny-Mayweather prime fight leaving me feeling cheated. They're unreliable events.

I would watch RAF but I don't even know how currently. I'm not just going to sign up for some strange service I am not familiar with which is how it feels to me now. There is no reason some of these guys are battling each other. I would consider it but it would be easier if it was an add on to a currently popular streaming service. I think gaining subscribers in some ways is more difficult than ever. At least for me as a value seeker...

[RawDog]

I think they post most of the events on YouTube for free.  Not as good as being able to watch live but anytime you get to watch wrestling for free is a win!

[MoveCountermove]

On 4/1/2026 at 11:18 PM, jmoney said:

Interesting question...for me you get a LOT for your time and money with NCAAs and B1G tourney- you know what you're getting. When you want to launch some niche sporting card event, it's helpful to centralize it some place where people can reliably access it. For boxing it was HBO and Showtime doing a good job reliably producing events for a long time. UFC did a pretty good job of this also. I'm not as much of a UFC fan as I was boxing so can't completely speak to this. I think wrestling will struggle with not offering this on Netflix. That's like the modern day HBO- a streaming site nearly everyone has.

I stopped being a boxing fan because these 1 time events were either mis-judged, a guy fought injured or didn't train for it, and the Arum De La Hoya feud ruined boxing exhausting my favorite fighters' careers and we never got a Manny-Mayweather prime fight leaving me feeling cheated. They're unreliable events.

I would watch RAF but I don't even know how currently. I'm not just going to sign up for some strange service I am not familiar with which is how it feels to me now. There is no reason some of these guys are battling each other. I would consider it but it would be easier if it was an add on to a currently popular streaming service. I think gaining subscribers in some ways is more difficult than ever. At least for me as a value seeker...

Agree that boxing began to wear on me…I’m from GR and grew up watching the Mayweather family and Floyd come up through the golden gloves in our area and stuff - dude was elite elite, completely unfair for the amateurs he was facing. And as much as I love watching him, in time it felt like there was significant politics going on, fucking certain matchups for a time until, as mentioned, dudes were outside their prime or what have you. It just felt like protecting each fighter’s brand and record and stuff became central to the plot of the sport…which shouldn’t even have a plot. I got a bit sour on it, and luckily enough Floyd kind of fell off fighting about that same time, and boxing had really dissipated since.

I used to be a big UFC fan as well, always cheering for the former wrestlers (cuz, obviously). I watched every event from 1 to about 200 or so, including the fight nights. I love how hard some of these guys go, and GSP was my favorite back in the day. Then I watched him and Hendrix fight, he looked like he probably lost, and then he retained the belt. It didn’t sit well, and the politics were already all over that sport. Now it’s got a fight card on some network every 4 days and it’s almost too diluted for me, plus the way it feels like they need to continuously prop up their stars for the organization to stay afloat.

RAF to me is a lot of what you said. I don’t need to see 45 year old Frankie Edgar wrestle 40 year old Clay Guida or whatever it was, and others like that. I see what they are doing, I see the tangential relationship to WWE, which I really dislike, and in the 5 or so events I’ve watched (all for free, mind you), I’ve caught roughly 1.5 matches that have been interesting. Part of that is the freestyle aspect for me, part of it is the matchup situation. 
 

Should you want to check out RAF for free, you can find the full event replays on Fox Nation’s YouTube channel with a simple search. They have all of them up at this point I think, even 12 which was like last weekend or whatever. Honestly, I will never pay for these events now that I know it’s uploaded to YouTube for free, almost always in full. AND it had time stamps so I can click right to the start whistle of each match

[RAFWiki]

10 minutes ago, MoveCountermove said:

Honestly, I will never pay for these events now that I know it’s uploaded to YouTube for free, almost always in full. AND it had time stamps so I can click right to the start whistle of each match

I mean...this isn't any different than boxing or MMA.

You're paying to watch the events live. Anyone can find the matches for free afterward, but that's no fun. 

And Fox Nation subscriptions are usually heavily discounted anyway. So at most you're paying $72/year for 24 live RAF events, 12 live NextGen events, plus all the live press conferences and post-event scrums. 

[MoveCountermove]

1 hour ago, RAFWiki said:

I mean...this isn't any different than boxing or MMA.

You're paying to watch the events live. Anyone can find the matches for free afterward, but that's no fun. 

And Fox Nation subscriptions are usually heavily discounted anyway. So at most you're paying $72/year for 24 live RAF events, 12 live NextGen events, plus all the live press conferences and post-event scrums. 

RAF did 12 events in the last year, not 24. Also, I much prefer to pay $0 to $72, and catching the events after the fact doesn’t bother me one way or another, as they have not gotten their hooks in on me thus far and the only place I need to worry about ruining the outcomes is this blog, and I just wanna see wrestling so even that doesn’t matter much to me. Par Terre doesn’t excite me much so I’m mostly there for the takedowns

I don’t fault anyone who desires to pay for the services to watch the events live, for whatever their reasoning. But I don’t see myself ever shelling out for that when the free option is available and doesn’t gatekeep, and I can’t be alone in that

[LJB]

wrestling "fans" are the type to have a kid open the back door of a gym for them so they can avoid the $5 bill to walk into a HS dual or tourney...

[RAFWiki]

19 minutes ago, MoveCountermove said:

RAF did 12 events in the last year, not 24. 

They're going to be doing one domestic event each month and one international event each month going forward

2x12=24

[Gene Mills Fan]

RAF    How can anyone complain. Ok i guess some are just critiquing???   I can stand a few duds with so Many exciting matchups included. 

[LJB]

anyone complaining about $72 a year (at the most) to watch the level of athletes on every card is not a wrestling fan...

they are merely wrestling "fans"

 

[bnwtwg]

40 minutes ago, RAFWiki said:

one international event each month

@LJB be like

[LJB]

it is going to happen...

[LJB]

this is the type of match that is being put together right now in other organizations...

i can only assume the huge success of RAF has inspired other orgs that wrestling has a viable international audience...

[RAFWiki]

10 minutes ago, LJB said:

this is the type of match that is being put together right now in other organizations...

i can only assume the huge success of RAF has inspired other orgs that wrestling has a viable international audience...

In Austria, all the nation's top MMA guys who used to wrestle decided to start an RAF-inspired freestyle wrestling league instead:

 

[LJB]

[MoveCountermove]

3 hours ago, RAFWiki said:

They're going to be doing one domestic event each month and one international event each month going forward

2x12=24

Right, but they didn’t. So to say $72 for 24 events would be incorrect because that hasn’t happened. They could fold in 3 months and then would never have achieved that 24 number. So until they do, it’s just a plan on paper (Not suggesting they will fold, just stating the obvious as so many attempts before them have had similar fates).

1x12 =12

1x1x12 =12 

1212 =1

121 =12

[MoveCountermove]

3 hours ago, LJB said:

anyone complaining about $72 a year (at the most) to watch the level of athletes on every card is not a wrestling fan...

they are merely wrestling "fans"

 

Anyone paying $72 a year (at the most) when free is available doesn’t understand finance and is merely an “adult”

[RAFWiki]

12 minutes ago, MoveCountermove said:

Anyone paying $72 a year (at the most) when free is available doesn’t understand finance and is merely an “adult”

My brother in Christ, you admitted less than a month ago that you're a Flo subscriber:

 

[MPhillips]

20 minutes ago, RAFWiki said:

My brother in Christ

There was another guy...

[LJB]

41 minutes ago, MoveCountermove said:

Anyone paying $72 a year (at the most) when free is available doesn’t understand finance and is merely an “adult”

 

wrestling "fans" are the type to have a kid open the back door of a gym for them so they can avoid the $5 bill to walk into a HS dual or tourney...

[ugarles]

5 hours ago, Gene Mills Fan said:

RAF    How can anyone complain. Ok i guess some are just critiquing???   I can stand a few duds with so Many exciting matchups included. 

I can't stand the esthetics of RAF - it tries to package freestyle like MMA or WWE and it makes it impossible for me to watch anything but the matches after the fact. I went to the Philly event and the heat from the intro-fire blasts hit the entire gym like a wave. Plus a lot of trying to make fetch happen with ex-MMA names like Urijah Faber with some wrestling background. There's some audience for it, obviously, but it's pretty tedious outside of the matches themselves.

[Truzzcat]

On 3/31/2026 at 11:27 PM, WrestlingPhD said:

It seems most wrestling fans and sports fans as a whole are most interested and excited in high stakes and built up events like NCAA D1 wrestling championships, with the tournament being only once a year and the typical four years of eligibility only to compete. Also, the Olympics occurring only once every four years.
 

On the other hand there are the many one off, low stakes matches that RAF has been doing. I want to but just can’t seem to get excited about some of these low stakes, one off matches in RAF

Do others feel the same?

I think if they could adopt a PFL style format to a smaller scale where you wrestle a season at your division and then half their version of the "million dollar tournament" that would be pretty cool and add a little bit of heat to every match that being said I have very much enjoyed the last 10 or so cards once they get in their groove. 

@Husker_Du throw the PFL tournament style in the thought chamber

[BruceyB]

7 hours ago, MoveCountermove said:

Anyone paying $72 a year (at the most) when free is available doesn’t understand finance and is merely an “adult”

I don't pay for RAF because I have very little interest, but this take is insane.

Two entrees and an appetizer is $72 after tip. 

What would you spend $72 on?

[MoveCountermove]

4 minutes ago, BruceyB said:

I don't pay for RAF because I have very little interest, but this take is insane.

Two entrees and an appetizer is $72 after tip. 

What would you spend $72 on?

Taking it seriously is at least as insane as being LJB

[peanut]

I really love what RAF has done: focused on entertainment, which is what money-making sports must do. 

It seems to me that there is a way to have a high-stakes competition while also having multiple entertaining “cards.”

The National Duals could be changed into the following format: multiple cards in multiple locations over multiple weekends. Winners (judged by weight class and team) keep going, losers are out. Tournament scoring. The final card would hopefully look like an all-star meet. I have to assume ESPN would be interested in something like this.

Is this just a mini NCAA tournament, but drawn out? Yes, but it’s also a great idea. Think about the NBA Cup. This is a golden opportunity to improve the experience for spectators. 

Edited August 29 by peanut