Is BJJ just a fad?

**Moleculo** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 3:34pm

Originally Posted by Dochter

Wait, I'm confused. Doesn't something have to be popular to be considered a fad?
How many people that do martial arts do bjj?
It's not even popular in its own field.

A: It's VERY popular.

B. Considering how long other arts have been able to take root and how many schools and styles there are to choose from, I'd say a fair number.

C. refer to B and consider that most people do not want to grapple, they want to fly like Neo.

**Dochter** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 3:38pm

Where you live must be massively different than where I live.
Here bjj isn't very popular at all. Hell we have to rent space from a tkd school.

I would guess everyone at bullshido's view point is pretty biased because either we like fighting sports and so know other people that do or because we spend too much time on the internet. The simple fact of the matter is that a lot of places can't support even one bjj or mma school and yet every other type of art is massively prevelant.

**Aesopian** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 3:40pm

Forseti, let me see if I follow you.

1. BJJ is a fad.
2. BJJ is Kosen judo.

So BJJ manages to be a widely popular AND an obscure form of judo at the same time? :confused2

**Moleculo** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 3:59pm

Originally Posted by Dochter

Where you live must be massively different than where I live.
Here bjj isn't very popular at all. Hell we have to rent space from a tkd school.

I would guess everyone at bullshido's view point is pretty biased because either we like fighting sports and so know other people that do or because we spend too much time on the internet. The simple fact of the matter is that a lot of places can't support even one bjj or mma school and yet every other type of art is massively prevelant.

I live a stone's throw away from Team Quest, and there are more than a few schools teaching BJJ as part of their curriculum if not exclusively, in fact there are even community college classes and ads for private instruction that I have seen around, not to mention that when I was taking TKD, our instructor brought in two top guys from the Machado school to do seminars.

Maybe you should think about moving to a real city. (kidding)

**Dochter** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 4:02pm

Reese,
Case study:
Davis California (where I used to live).
This city boasts a large public university with ~25,000 undergraduates. That's around 12500 men between 18 and 22, the prime demographic for bjj or even mma. Is there a single bjj school? No. Is there a single mma school? No.

You have to go down the freeway to Sacramento to find bjj being taught. There are around 1.75 million people in Sacramento, not counting surrounding areas, and another state university. In Sacramento to my knowledge there are two people teaching bjj. One with an actual school and another teaching in essentially a club type system.

Wanna guess how many martial arts schools there are between the two cities? I don't. I'd bet it isn't near on the same order of the two bjj schools in the area.

**Dochter** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 4:04pm

Reese, you don't live in a typical city then. You've got one of the few mma celebrities there, your market is going to be vastly different than what most of us see.

**Forseti** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 4:14pm

Originally Posted by Aesopian

Forseti, let me see if I follow you.

1. BJJ is a fad.
2. BJJ is Kosen judo.

So BJJ manages to be a widely popular AND an obscure form of judo at the same time? :confused2

Yep. I don't know why its that confusing. BJJ is a popular fad that is little more than just a style of judo and when everyone catches on and realizes that it really isn't anything special, different or unique than what has always existed been available and even popular, they will realize that there is no particular reason to train in BJJ as opposed to something else (like judo). And the fad will have run its course.

And actually, people are already catching (and have caught) on because I am just getting this from widely available sources. It just needs to trickle down to the newer neophytes and the recalcitrant nutriders. Of course, that is not to say that BJJ is worthless or bullshit since that would be like saying Judo is. It's just kind of like Hapkido is to Aikido or TKD to Karate in its relation to Judo, except for possibly even more similar.

It is just a pariticular school of an obscure form of judo -- there are greater variations in styles of karate. There will always be BJJers just like there are hapkidoists as well as aikidoists and TKDists as well as karatekas.

**Moleculo** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 4:16pm

The number of BJJ schools there are would depend on how many qualified instructors there are and also how many of them would be willing to move to Davis with the funds to open a school. I guess my point is that BJJ is still in it's infancy and as such is not going to have the amount of instructors to accomidate an unquantifiable number of prospective students.

What I do know is that kids are watching the UFC in droves and fans in general want to ape their favorite athletes, much like baseball, WWF or in this case UFC.

It may not be the textbok definition of a fad but is has the hallmarks.

**Aesopian** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 4:16pm

Originally Posted by Forseti

Same dumb argument we have heard a thousand times before.

Oh, so basically, you're clueless.

**Forseti** · Posted On: 2/14/2005 4:21pm

I have seen BJJ and MT in pretty much every city I have been to. I do think that you will find a million more karate and TKD schools though. But, I don't see why that is particularly relevant. Anyone that is into NHB as a spectator (or as a fighter) certainly knows who Royce Gracie and what BJJ is.

My experience is that your average redneck male knows what the UFC is and that Royce Gracie was originally the undefeatable champion of it with BJJ. (What they don't normally know is that it was originally co-produced by Rorion Gracie.) And, this is what is meant by "its a fad" -- not that the soccer moms are all putting their kids in it but that everyoen thinks its the ultimate fighting style.