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How common is this in modern BJJ comps?
- Thread starter JohnPJones
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By "this" do you mean being a bad sport about well-known behaviors which are clearly allowed in the ruleset and then losing badly? Probably quite common. If you don't like guard pulling, don't enter tournaments that permit it. This guy's behavior is the inverse of an MMA competitor on the ground trying to shame their opponent into their guard instead of resetting on the feet.
I actually know the kid who pulled guard (he was 16 here, I think). He trains MMA and can wrestle, but simply chose not to do so at this tournament. It seems to have worked out fine.
I actually know the kid who pulled guard (he was 16 here, I think). He trains MMA and can wrestle, but simply chose not to do so at this tournament. It seems to have worked out fine.
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I've seen it especially in higher divisions. When I first got my blue belt I went to a comp ( no gi) and I went against a brown belt who imediatly pulled guard. As I would approach he would scoot back. So I hesitated and the ref started giving me warnings for not engaging and said nothing to the guy about scooting away. After 3rd warning I got frustrated and went all in and got arm dragged, back taken and choked. Changed my perception a little bit of tournaments.
That being said, I think it is a great strategy is if you tie up a few times or sense all the movements of your oppent of being a much better wrestler than you, to pull guard. Pressure is now on the wrestler to also do lots of open guard passing drills.
That being said, I think it is a great strategy is if you tie up a few times or sense all the movements of your oppent of being a much better wrestler than you, to pull guard. Pressure is now on the wrestler to also do lots of open guard passing drills.
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Seems like laying on your back and spreading your legs is a bit of bitch move
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pulling guard being thrown go to move for people before even sizing up their opponent seems like a bitch move and if they continue to allow it, I wouldn’t be surprised if the rules changed making guard more meta, and BJJ tournament training less applicable outside of BJJ tournaments…basically going the way of karate and sport fighting in the next 10-20 years
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I don't know why a guy that can't even start to pass a guard will compete in a division that allows heel hooks
Passing guard is an art, you have to take risks, to learn skills and strategies.
People whining about guard pullers just suck at pretty much 50% of what BJJ is
Passing guard is an art, you have to take risks, to learn skills and strategies.
People whining about guard pullers just suck at pretty much 50% of what BJJ is
Imagine being the guy that tapped after said move
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And? I’d rather have the integrity of not doing some bitch move at all.
it’s like the point fighters who basically fight backwards because the back is not only non-scoring but generally off limits.
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As a BJJ brown belt and someone has about 20 years overall grappling experience I got real mixed feelings on this guard pulling issue.
On one hand I get doing it. I have pulled guard myself in comps in the gi (damn you judokas). It’s just good strategy given the rule set if you don’t have any experience standing and lets face it 90% of gyms spend very little time working on this. BJJ has always been about controlling and finishing an opponent on the ground and if we get rid of it or even severely penalize guard pulling we run the risk of most matches being a standing stall fest. Plus as BJJers we just want to get right to the action on the ground and that’s the clearest path.
On the other hand this is the BJJ equivalent of tippy-tapping TKD type scoring. It’s bad for the overall practicality of the sport. I get that the vast majority of practitioners don’t care about that, but placing sport and fun over practicality is a dangerous road to travel that can eventually lead to McDojoism. Granted the sparring heavy aspect of BJJ helps fight against that but you can’t tell me it’s overall dumb to practice an art that specializes in ground fighting that doesn’t care about actually taking it to the ground.
I’d be in favor of just giving a point to the opponent for pulling guard in the same weight class (allow pulling in absolute though). If you're truly better on the ground you’ll hit a sweep and still be up on points. If you sub them even better. In the case in the video above it wouldn’t have made a difference either way since the guard puller quickly hooked the guy trying to mock him. Might be an unpopular opinion but hey I stand by it.
On one hand I get doing it. I have pulled guard myself in comps in the gi (damn you judokas). It’s just good strategy given the rule set if you don’t have any experience standing and lets face it 90% of gyms spend very little time working on this. BJJ has always been about controlling and finishing an opponent on the ground and if we get rid of it or even severely penalize guard pulling we run the risk of most matches being a standing stall fest. Plus as BJJers we just want to get right to the action on the ground and that’s the clearest path.
On the other hand this is the BJJ equivalent of tippy-tapping TKD type scoring. It’s bad for the overall practicality of the sport. I get that the vast majority of practitioners don’t care about that, but placing sport and fun over practicality is a dangerous road to travel that can eventually lead to McDojoism. Granted the sparring heavy aspect of BJJ helps fight against that but you can’t tell me it’s overall dumb to practice an art that specializes in ground fighting that doesn’t care about actually taking it to the ground.
I’d be in favor of just giving a point to the opponent for pulling guard in the same weight class (allow pulling in absolute though). If you're truly better on the ground you’ll hit a sweep and still be up on points. If you sub them even better. In the case in the video above it wouldn’t have made a difference either way since the guard puller quickly hooked the guy trying to mock him. Might be an unpopular opinion but hey I stand by it.
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It's uncommon because it's a bad play. He's required to get a grip before he sits. This means that when he hits the ground he has one or two points of control. He then wants to establish two more points of control. Instead he lets go of said controls and transitions, if we can call it that, to a butt scoot, where then scooches forwards, presumably to establish points of control and then submit. It's objectively shitty jiujitsu.
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It's well and long past that point don't you think?
I mean you are a brown and many blacks have limited to no standing grappling.
Renee was offering legit online blue belts from film study before forced to turn it into a 'technical blue'.
The sport of BJJ is big business and standing grappling required more grind and athleticism, their not going to deter their market base.
If anything it's only going to get worse. Sport ground grappling is the BJJ niche now and what people pay to do.
Inconvenient questions like "how are you going to actually get the fight to the ground" have no place in ruining the fun and the onwards march to a sport BJJ brown and bb.
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Preach brother. As a former wrestler, judoka and current BJJer, I have zero issue with guys pulling guard in training or comp. I mean, my personal training objective is to be well-rounded everywhere but I'm not going to dictate what someone else's game should be.
If someone wants to pull guard, fine. If you choose to engage them there (or you're forced to by the ruleset) then you'd better know how to pass guard while avoiding sweeps and subs.
My issue with guard pulling is purely around sport scoring. It's logically inconsistent to not penalize guard pulls while awarding 2 points for taking someone down i.e. putting them in guard. Don't want to give up 2 points for getting taken down? Well. I can just put myself in the position other guy is trying to put me in and because I did it first, I lose no points! In yo' face MF!!! And then if I sweep him i.e. put him in the same position I just put myself in, I'm now up 2-0!
The most logical way to reconcile this is to penalize pulls by 1 point as you suggest. It takes some skill to pull guard while retaining control and not getting passed but it's impossible to ignore that you're basically taking yourself down. Losing 1 point instead of 2 acknowledges both aspects.
The other way to reconcile this would be to not award any points for a TD. Standup doesn't matter and only way to score is on the ground. But this would be akin to going full retard. "Pure" BJJers would become even more dogshit on the feet and I don't think that would be good for anyone.
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My take is similar. Pulling guard makes sense within a strictly sport context given that the rules are what they are. You know the rules when you enter the tournament, and complaining about them during the event you willingly entered is dumb.
However, I don't think free guard pulling is the right thing to be structurally encouraging. My personal hobby horse is that all scoring should be based on position totally independent of the process that arrived there (except when going backwards in the positional hierarchy). Takedowns, guard pulls, and reversals are combined under "You gain top position". A takedown followed by a pass scores the same as a throw directly to side mount, etc. While doing this would change the incentive structure in certain situations, I think overall it would create more rounded grapplers and would certainly remove most of the ambiguity from refereeing.
(Side question: What do people think about awarding minor points for escaping to the feet?)
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Are you sure? It might encourage more standing grappling since as you mentioned, awarding points for td also enocurages the inferior standup player to pull guard to avoid being thrown.
Best solution in BJJ rules would probably be to award 1 point for a takedown, and -1 for guard pulling so there is still some incentive to get top position.
Sure. Guy did what he had to do to win, within the rules.
A few years ago, I entered some random competition which had a weird scoring system. Lost a match on points whereas if it was standard IBJJF scoring I would've won. My coach gave me the "Should just stick with standard tournaments and stay away from the rest of the crap".... I just said "Meh, it sucks, but I knew what I signed up for"
Just own it. Just a sport
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I'm with you on position-based scoring but intent also matters. If a guy pulls guard, he's initiating the action so deserves some credit for that. But under current rules, other guy is incentivized to put the guard puller in the position he wants to be in, so becomes a mindfuck of which player deserves more credit for imposing their game.
It's tough to reconcile because guard is the signature position of BJJ and under current rules, it's the easier to score from. All else being equal, it's easier to sweep than pass guard, which is why sweeps are worth 2 but passes 3. So all else being equal, pulling guard is the dominant strategy if you want to win on points.
I used to think 2 point penalty for pulling guard made sense (you're giving up position so fair is fair). But I think that would just lead to BJJ matches resembling Judo white belts spazzing for the TD.
Reconciling points for a TD followed by a pass vs. TD into side control is another aspect of BJJ scoring that's not internally consistent. The international wrestling styles and Judo have always awarded more points for bigger throws that expose your back to the mat. Even folkstyle (U.S. scholastic wrestling) which for decades stuck with the 2 points for any TD as BJJ does I believe now awards 3 points for TD into danger position i.e. pin position.
This would be awesome but I don't think it's consistent with the BJJ ethos which has always been about finishing on the ground. If they did this, they should also reward riding time as collegiate folkstyle now does. But that would then penalize being on bottom which is another can of worms.
That would be akin to leaving scoring as is but penalizing guard pulls by -2 points i.e. no one would ever pull guard and BJJ comps would look like Judo white belts going at it.
It's a bit of buyer beware. You'd like to think that, if you've been in the sport for awhile, you'll know that sitting your butt on to concrete in a "fight" isn't very smart. The whole Artie Ziff "Come into my guard and meet your doom" is not really good...
Roger Gracie did once say that he only used about 20% of his BJJ in MMA.
On the points thing... I was visited a school where they did a annual tournament across their affiliates. The curriculum was very standup/takedown based. The first year they did standard IBJJF rules. Right after the coaches started tossing around ideas just to shake things up. One suggestion was -1 for a guard pull. One of the head coaches that competed said "I'd probably still pull guard. Numerous times if I need to". Wasn't that he had no confidence in his stand up, in fact he was probably top 3 in the tournament but he had so much more confidence in his guard game that he'd rather go -1 as many times as needed so he had more time to attack from there
I'm fine with that in the short term. In the long term, I think you'd see a significant increase in the quality of standup.
I don't think it would be a bad thing for BJJ to back away from the hyper-specialization around the guard for its own sake. I'm not one of those guys who thinks the MMA is the only litmus test for effective BJJ, but we can see clearly that the world's most dangerous guard doesn't matter if you can't get and keep your opponent on the ground.
I think top points take care of the incentives.
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pulling guard is initiating action? whenever I see someone pull guard it’s always been reactive and defensive, rather than proactive.
