Why Catch Wrestling is the grappling future in mma

Classic Forums Old School: Bullshido Classics and Mega Threads
81

On Catch and leg locks: I’m sure that there are BJJ schools that teach them, we just don’t have them here. Around here, most Jiu Jitsu schools will not even discuss leg locks until you reach purple belt. Catch school, as I understand it, allow leg locks from day one. The result of this is that a BJJer has no experience at all with anyone trying to attack his legs until he gets to purple, and since he hasn’t done any leg locks earlier, his leg attacking game will be weak compared to his armlocks and chokes.

I can back this up with an experience I had in a no gi tournament that allowed leg locks. Twice guys from BJJ schools went for ankle locks on me, which resulted in a faint squeeze on my calf and an evil smile on my face as I spun into a top positon and started looking for submissions of my own.

Then I got ankle locked by a catch guy in the finals. Unlike the vaguely discomforting squeeze of a BJJ footlock, this felt like everything south of my knee was about to be ripped off in Italian zombie movie fashion, and I tapped out with both hands at once. So based solely on my experience, catch has better leg locks than jiu jitsu.

82

Not only has he not answered, he refuses to answer because he believes it’s a red herring and somehow not relevant to the discussion.

^^I can relate to this. I learned leg locks from the beginning because I trained with some catch guys it’s resulted in some unintentional hilarity such as me tapping brown belts as a white belt.

83

Just getting back to the one of the points made by the OP, Catch won’t be the future because it’s not fucking popular enough. Casual fans who may be interesting in training in MMA or submission grappling or whatever won’t think about catch because there isn’t an extremely visible fighter known predominantly for Catch. Of course, you’ll argue that Josh Barnett or Sakuraba are visible fighters; however, Barnett is fighting in WVR Sengoku and Sakuraba is in DREAM and isn’t well known to casual American fans (is Sakuraba big in Europe?). Moreover, not only is BJJ more readily available (BJJ is everywhere) but Jiu-Jitsu has (somewhat) become a catch-all term for submission grappling. This makes people want to do BJJ even more since they don’t know about other styles. For example, one of the guys I train with first thought that Judo was all striking like Karate. ANYWAY, my point is that Catch isn’t the future, unless you mean fucking decades from now. We now return to our regulary scheduled programming of flaming.

84

Does anyone know if Masakazu Imanari is a catch wrestler?

85

According to wikipedia he is. Of course, wiki isn’t empirical. Watching him though would certainly lead some to believe that he is at least moderately familiar with catch wrestling.

86

“oh but catch has better leglocks”

… Sombo anyone? and it really depends on the gym, the third submission I learned in my BJJ gym was a freaking calf crush.

Imanari is a part of team Roken, a Japanese shooto (catch-derived with Judo influence) gym, but I’m pretty sure he’s also a BJJ brown.

87

I think the point should be made that Catch, Sombo, and BJJ have equally good leglocks, but that the first two emphasize them much more and earlier than BJJ typically does. For the most part, aren’t they the same locks? Ankle lock, toe hold, knee bar, calf crush, and heel hooks are the same in BJJ as in Catch or Sombo (I’m sure there are some basic locks I missed, and some especially sneaky ones as well).

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As far as I know they are. That’s why I made the point earlier that all the good techniques from catch have already made their way into BJJ.

89

That’s a little presumptuous. There are incredibly badass throws in Judo (that seem to work and are useful) that are hardly ever taught in BJJ. There has to be at least one technique worth a damn in Catch that isn’t in BJJ. The laws of probability and large numbers have to back that up. I hope.

90

As for catch wrestling to be the future…maybe.

Then it will go the way of b.j.j.

then it will be all b.j.j and it will replay in an endless loop of fucking fail, because no one will ever get the right answer…

Let me explain. After Royce dominated “fighters” in the first four UFCs everyone got on the b.j.j nut-riding.

Ok, fine, dandy, good.

Most b.j.j schools work techniques from the guard, am i right? As a vast majority of the stuff you do, is from the guard, right?

Anyway, so as a result, everyone is like LOL I’VE GOT GUARD…oh wait, you can punch me in teh face…(even Royce didn’t actively look for guard, he always wanted top position)

thus the guard became relatively…neutral, in the late 90s.

Then everyone (ok, mostly everyone) focused on their wrestling, to get to the top position, where its harder to get hit, and then use their submissions.

If everyone jumps on the catch wrestling’s nuts, everyone is going to forget that the guard can be a dangerous place, and thus, the trend starts all over.

The key? Cross training. Both wrestling and jits. the guard should never be a go to position, it should be a “oh shit, i fucked up, now i’ve got to fix it” position.

91

there is…its called takedowns. (lol)

92

Word.

93

The last few posters seem to be confused.

This is wrestling:

This is catch wrestling:

94

and another thing, there are techniques that make the guard a completely worthless position

lol jaw lock

Its a sad day that only students of Mark Tripp, Gene Lebell, and a few others that i can’t think of will know what i mean by that technique…

95

HELL NO.

wtf is this shit you are saying from your mouth?

Is this Diary of a BJJ Teen here?

96

I was going simply by what the OP said.

and in the words of a man that will know more then i can EVER hope, “Its all wrestling, the only difference is what are we wearing, and what are the rules?”

97

Oh slow your roll, son.

I’m not saying b.j.jers ignore other positions, and i didn’t mean to say that we favor the guard more (which we do, don’t lie), but B.j.j OVER PROMOTES the guard…

98

a vast majority of the stuff you do, is from the guard, right?

wrong

To suggest such brings hilarious images of the BJJ Teen to mind… but still isn’t true.

I wouldn’t say that 50% of what I’m taught is from the guard. That’d be way too much. Guard bottom anyway. If by “vast majority” you mean “over half” and by “from the guard” you mean “any variant of full, half, or open guard, whether attacking from top or bottom” then you are probably right. Otherwise… blech.

99

I don’t know if BJJ over promotes the guard, it just happens that it’s an important position to know because most escapes end up in guard so you have to know what to do from there; I’m almost positive you can’t just call timeout and get to stand up. Upa, knee/elbow, frame escape, replacing guard from 1/2 guard, etc. Of course, BJJ practitioners are taught to acquire a better position if possible, but lots of takedowns and escapes or even moves to a better position end up in guard (sometimes whether we want them to or not) so it has to be practiced.

100

Perhaps we’re at differnet levels. Let me go into further detail.

I’m still a schmexy white belt. We’re taught alot of guard work, but also alot out everything else, HOWEVER, as a whole, i’ve seen that b.j.jers are more willing to work from their guard, then judo/sambo/JJJ guys.

99% of the guys i’ve rolled with (from various schools) are happy to go to guard, if given the opportunity.

And look at the late 90s in terms of mma. Wrestler shoots in, bjj guy pulls guard, boring match that perpetuates bjj is teh ghey stereotype.