Mekhi Lewis signs with RAF, draws Gadzhimagomedov
The NCAA champ makes his Real American Freestyle debut on the Fox Nation broadcast in Las Vegas.
Mekhi Lewis has signed with Real American Freestyle and will wrestle Akhmed Gadzhimagomedov at RAF 14, per Justin Basch. The date is October 23 in Las Vegas. RAF confirmed the matchup and billed it as "NCAA CHAMP VS WORLD MEDALIST."
NCAA CHAMP VS WORLD MEDALIST
RAF says the card streams on Fox Nation, with tickets available through the promotion. Neither Basch nor RAF listed a weight for the match in their announcements.
Gadzhimagomedov is the World medalist half of the billing, and Lewis is the NCAA champ half. That is as far as either post goes on resumes, so anything beyond it is on the fan to fill in.
What it adds to RAF 14
RAF 14 keeps stacking. The Lewis booking lands on a Las Vegas card that has already been filling out in public over the past two weeks, including the matches we covered earlier. Basch's post was the first word that Lewis had put pen to paper with the promotion at all, and the opponent came attached to the same announcement rather than trickling out later.
Our take: pairing a signing announcement with a named opponent on a dated, televised card is RAF doing the thing that keeps this series moving, no waiting period between "he's in" and "here's the match."
The framing RAF chose does the selling. A freestyle World medalist against an American NCAA champion is the cleanest version of the pitch this promotion has, and it is the version that travels to a Fox Nation audience that may not know either man's record.
What to watch
A weight class for Lewis vs Gadzhimagomedov, which neither announcement specified.
October 23 in Las Vegas, on Fox Nation.
Mekhi Lewis signs with RAF.