Is BJJ watered down in .....

Underground BJJ Ground
1

Is BJJ watered down in your state,region,neck of the woods.

I tend to think that the further you get away from metropolis type cities the lower the level........

what do you think?

2

I think it completely depends on the school.

 

3

I disagree

4

I personally live in Maine, and although ive trained with some unbelievable players I tend to think IN GENERAL that compared to even lower new england we have some catching up to do.

5

define: watered down...

6

Some places may not be as developed but there are a lot of good guys all over..

Annd of course some bad as well

7

watered down = 6 month blue belts, only one grappling

tourney that features basicly 3 or 4 schools that

train together on a regular basis.

8

and some already showing signs of TMA type behavior.

9

I live in LA, there are tons of 6month blue belts. I guess it's REALLY watered down here.

Has it occurred to anyone that maybe with more people training, the learning curve is much more steep so people are advancing faster and faster? Soon, a 6-7yr black be thought of as someone who got promoted too fast.

10

My instructor put it best when he said it's up to the students to do the research when deciding who to train with.

There are purples and browns starting to open schools every 5 miles, but I'd rather train with a Gracie Barra Blackbelt.

It's the uninformed walking into the nearest school that ultimately contributes to this "watering down".

11

Just because you're a Gracie Barra BB, doesn't make you the best teacher.

I don't see an issue of a brown belt opening a school. Purple, I have some, but that's the only game in town, then that's all you got.

12

we used to test for each belt encluding Black, but

then my old instructor decided that it might be too

TMA to charge a fee. So now there are tests for some

and not for others and I have no idea the ryme or

reason. I cant say which I prefer but I think the

test is a beneficial tool (like a suped up private)

to tweek technique.

13

lets see if I can stimulate conversation without offending anyone. In Maine there are about half a dozen schools I can think of that have good or better bjj programs. Maine Jiu Jitsu Academy, AMMA,Farmington Fight Foundry(formerly elite-I think?),Team Irish, Simian(formerly drunken monkeys),and a rangely school taught by Jon Lamarche BJJ brown belt. Now, the first two have Black Belt instructors Aaron Blake and Jay Jack respectively. Farmington has Noel Danforth high Purple. I dont know Marcus Davis's belt rank (we all know he rocks though) and Simian has Rob Lewis Purple.

The main difference would appear to be numbers. I know that Aaron has between 20 and 30 , so does Noel. But Jay from most accounts has like between 40 and 50 or more that train bjj/grappling. The rest have between 10 and 20 hard cores and thats it.

14

I don't see an issue of a brown belt opening a school. Purple, I have some, but that's the only game in town, then that's all you got.

Note:

A few months ago, Wu made a similar post, except it read:

I don't see an issue of a purple belt opening a school. Blue, I have some, but that's the only game in town, then that's all you got.

15

Yes, I did post that. If that's what you go, then that's what you got, no?

I started with 2 purples because that was the only game in town. It's not so exclusive anymore to be a purple belt, at least in SoCal? I did see the difference in details and teaching between a black belt instructor and the purple belts. Some guys in Michigan were blue belts and that's what they had. If you want to train and that's what you go then hey, what are you going to do.

Yeah, I contradicted myself. Thanks for pointing it out. I posted hastily or maybe my mind has changed in the past couple of months. I tend to think different as time passes. Is that wrong of me?

16

Wu, I think he was just teasing you because of your recent promotion... ;)

17

^ Correct.

18

...I'm an arumentative jerk, but I'm not that bad.

19

I think he hates me because I don't get the Internet Clown Joke Calls anymore. Really.

Plus, I was too shy to say hi to him at the last pan-ams. He's soooo dreamy.

20

Now the concentration of skill levels is a different story all together.

Aaron has about 6 full time purples half of which teach from time to time. He has like 15 or so blue belts floating around, and a shit load of low middle and high whites. Jay has a few purples i think and a bunch of fucking blue belt studs not to mention some sick whites.