Arman Tsarukyan will wrestle Dillon Danis for the inaugural RAF middleweight crossover title in the main event of RAF 14 this Friday, Oct. 23, in Las Vegas, MMANews.com and MMA Fighting reported. Khamzat Chimaev faces former UFC welterweight champion Robbie Lawler in the co-main event.
It’s a wrestling match with a belt nobody has held yet. Tsarukyan, who is still very much in the middle of the UFC lightweight picture, is chasing it at middleweight, which tells you something about how loosely RAF’s crossover divisions sit on top of the weight classes fans know from the octagon.
Where Both Men Stand in RAF
The promotion released its first crossover pound-for-pound rankings on Monday, and Tsarukyan came in at No. 3 with a 7-1 record in RAF. The one loss belongs to Colby Covington, who sits at No. 1, holds the cruiserweight crossover title and is 5-0 in the promotion. Danis is also on Covington’s list of victims, alongside former UFC champions Belal Muhammad, Chris Weidman and Luke Rockhold.
So the headliners share a common defeat, though their résumés diverge from there. Danis does not appear anywhere in the 20-name crossover rankings RAF published Monday, a list that runs from Covington down through names like Aaron Pico, Tyron Woodley, Michael Chandler and Frankie Edgar. Henry Cejudo is No. 2 at 2-1 after pinning Merab Dvalishvili in 36 seconds at RAF 12 in August to take the lightweight crossover belt. Chimaev and Dvalishvili round out the top five.
The UFC Picture
Tsarukyan’s MMA stock hasn’t cooled while he’s been collecting wins on the mat. MMA Mania’s updated Meta Rankings have him at No. 2 at lightweight, behind only Ilia Topuria, under champion Justin Gaethje. Gaethje became the undisputed 155-pound champion by beating Topuria at UFC Freedom 250 on the White House South Lawn in June.
What comes next for Gaethje is unsettled. Yahoo Sports’ power rankings noted talk that he could retire as champion, along with rumblings that Tsarukyan could get the fight before that happens. That remains a rumor, with nothing booked, but it explains why a lightweight contender’s choice to grapple at middleweight on a Friday in Vegas carries a little risk. A tweaked knee in a wrestling match would cost him a lot more than it costs most of the people on this card.
RAF 14 also lands the night before UFC 333 in Abu Dhabi, where Alexander Volkanovski defends the featherweight title against Movsar Evloev and Petr Yan meets Dvalishvili in their trilogy, so the weekend’s grappling fans will be busy.
Quick Take
On paper this is lopsided. Tsarukyan is 7-1 in the promotion and ranked third among everyone who has stepped onto its mats, while Danis lost to Covington and hasn’t cracked the top 20. Danis has made a career out of getting people to watch, and RAF clearly wants that attention attached to a new belt. But a man who has spent years trading takedowns with the best lightweights alive should be the one wearing it Friday night, and if he wins cleanly and walks out healthy, the next thing worth watching is whether the UFC calls about Gaethje.