Cody Garbrandt is heading to a wrestling mat, and Sergio Pettis will be waiting for him. MMA Fighting announced on X Friday that the former UFC bantamweight champion will face the former Bellator champion in a wrestling match at Real American Freestyle 15 in Chicago. The post closed by asking followers who they had, which is a fair question with no easy answer.
RAF 15 is scheduled for November 28, according to Bloody Elbow, and the card already had a Pettis on it. Anthony Pettis, Sergio’s older brother and the former UFC lightweight champion, is set to wrestle Donald Cerrone on the same show. That gives the family two matches on one night. The Garbrandt vs. Pettis announcement didn’t include a weight or a placement on the card.
Where both men are coming from
Garbrandt’s recent MMA résumé includes a loss to Raoni Barcelos. The former champ was one of the five straight wins Barcelos put together before his September 27 main event against Raul Rosas Jr., a fight that ended with Barcelos losing consciousness after a fifth-round takedown and leaving the Octagon on a stretcher. Barcelos told MMA Fighting this week that doctors still don’t know what happened and that retirement “hasn’t been ruled out.”
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Sergio Pettis’ most recent outing on record was in a boxing ring. He dropped a unanimous decision to Sabari Jaishankar in India in March 2025, per MMA Fighting. He was also back in Chicago on Friday, billed by the PFL alongside interim middleweight champion Johnny Eblen for a fan meet before PFL Chicago at Wintrust Arena. That made it a busy day for him in the city where he’ll now wrestle in six weeks.
That India loss is driving his brother’s schedule, too. Anthony Pettis is booked for a six-round super welterweight boxing match against Neeraj Goyat (21-4-2) on January 23, 2027, with Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam and Chennai in the running to host. Anthony said the fight is about settling the score for Sergio. “I have thought a lot about Sergio’s loss. This one is for him, and I am coming to win,” he said. Anthony is 1-1 as a boxer, with a majority decision over Roy Jones Jr. in April 2023 and a decision loss to Chris Avila on the Diaz vs. Masvidal card in July 2024.
So the Pettis calendar runs like this. Two brothers wrestle in Chicago on November 28, and eight weeks later the older one boxes in India on behalf of the younger one. That’s a heavier travel schedule than most UFC rosters manage in a year.
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Quick take
I like this booking a lot more than the usual nostalgia fare. Two former champions in a format with no strikes and nowhere to hide means the match comes down to hand fighting, stance and who’s willing to keep shooting when his lungs start burning. Nobody gets to coast on a knockout threat. I’m taking Garbrandt, though I’m not betting the house on it. A former champ coming off a loss tends to show up with something to prove, and in a pure wrestling match the guy who sets the pace usually wins the scrambles. If RAF announces a weight that favors Pettis, I reserve the right to change my mind before November 28.
