Judo the Wrestlers, Wrestle the Judoka

I've spent more than forty years grappling.

I wrestled Division I. I've trained and competed in judo, BJJ and MMA. I've spent enough time in different grappling rooms to realize that every style has things it does exceptionally well, and every style has things that it doesn't spend nearly as much time solving.

That has led to one of my favorite grappling mantras:

"Judo the wrestlers. Wrestle the judoka."

It's not meant to be clever. It's a reminder to look for the gap. When you know what someone has spent thousands of hours practicing, you should have a pretty good idea of what they're going to be comfortable doing. The question isn't always, "How do I beat what they're good at?" Sometimes the better question is, "How do I make them do something they aren't as good at?"

Judo the Wrestlers

Wrestlers are incredibly comfortable in a particular world. They are comfortable changing levels, penetrating, attacking legs, scrambling, driving through opponents, and spending a lot of time in positions where their hips are relatively low and their posture is built around defending takedowns.

So why play their game?

Against a good wrestler, I often want to bring the fight upward. Instead of immediately getting into a low, leg-attacking wrestling exchange, I'll look for upper-body grips, underhooks, overhooks, body locks and other forms of clinch control. The goal isn't simply to "do judo" because the other guy is a wrestler.

The goal is to change the problem.

A wrestler who is constantly worried about defending a double leg or single leg is operating in a familiar environment. But put him upright, hip-to-hip, with his balance being manipulated through upper-body grips, and suddenly some of the things he spends less time dealing with become available.

That's where judo becomes useful. Throws, trips and sweeps are particularly effective when you can control someone's posture and balance before they even realize they're in danger. A wrestler may have an incredible ability to defend a traditional wrestling shot, but that doesn't necessarily mean he is equally comfortable defending a foot sweep, inside trip, outside trip or other attack that comes from an upright clinch.

You're not necessarily beating the wrestler at wrestling. You're making him wrestle a different game.

Wrestle the Judoka

The same principle works in the opposite direction.

A good judoka is usually very comfortable standing upright and fighting for grips. They understand balance, posture, kuzushi and the relationship between their opponent's movement and their own throwing opportunities.

That's exactly why I don't necessarily want to give them the fight they're expecting.

I'll look underneath that upright posture.

Low shots become useful. Snap downs become useful. Level changes become useful.

The goal with a snap down isn't always to immediately put someone on the mat. Sometimes the real value is in what happens when they resist.

If I snap someone forward and they react by driving themselves backward to recover their posture, I've created another opportunity. Their attempt to get away from one problem can expose another.

That's one of the things I love about grappling. The technique isn't always the attack. The reaction to the attack is often the attack.

A judoka may be exceptionally good at controlling an opponent's posture from an upright stance, but that same upright stance can create opportunities for a wrestler who is willing to repeatedly threaten the legs and force reactions.

Again, I'm not trying to prove that wrestling is better than judo.

I'm trying to make the judoka solve a wrestling problem.

Find the Gap

This is really the principle underneath the mantra.

Every grappling style creates strengths, but those strengths come with tradeoffs.

Spend thousands of hours developing one particular set of positions, grips, movements and reactions and you are going to become extremely good at those things. But you're also going to spend less time solving problems outside that environment.

That doesn't mean those weaknesses are necessarily flaws. They're simply gaps in the athlete's experience. And those gaps become particularly interesting when you start crossing disciplines.

This Isn't About Style vs. Style

I don't think the lesson here is that wrestling beats judo, judo beats wrestling, or that there is some perfect hierarchy of grappling styles.

It doesn't work that way.

A great wrestler may have excellent judo. A great judoka may have outstanding wrestling. A Greco wrestler may have spent years developing defenses against leg attacks. A BJJ player may have a wrestling game that makes the traditional distinctions almost meaningless.

At a high level, these categories start to blur. That's actually the point.

The more complete your grappling becomes, the less interested you should be in simply identifying yourself as a wrestler, judoka or BJJ player. You should be interested in understanding the problems each system is designed to solve and recognizing where those solutions don't completely overlap.

That's where the opportunities live.

Attack the Gap

One of the things I enjoy most about MMA is that it forces you to think this way.

You don't get to choose an opponent who plays your game.

A fighter might be an excellent boxer but have limited experience defending takedowns. Another might be a great wrestler but uncomfortable striking at long range. Another might have tremendous BJJ but struggle when forced to wrestle against the cage.

The job isn't necessarily to prove that your skill is superior. The job is to identify where the two skill sets don't match. Then put the fight there.

That's what I mean when I say, judo the wrestlers, wrestle the judoka.

It's really just another way of saying: Don't attack the strength when the weakness is sitting right next to it.

Good grappling isn't just knowing more techniques. It's understanding the relationship between them. And sometimes the best attack isn't the technique you're best at.

It's the technique your opponent has spent the least time preparing to stop.