Ireland's best bjj players

David Jones

If it is only 16 fighters that won't matter. A 30 -40 minute battle can be very entertaining. Someone will always make a mistake.

r_obric

David Jones wrote: »

If it is only 16 fighters that won't matter. A 30 -40 minute battle can be very entertaining. Someone will always make a mistake.

so who are the 16?

Barry.Oglesby

Dunno. How about 8 invites and 8 qualifiers, picked out of a mini tournament I'll hold in my gym?

Sid_Justice

so keeping it open weight and not splitting ~75 + or -

NG-DOC

r_obric wrote: »

sub only is a problem fights can go on for 30-40 minutes with one person getting destroyed but not tapped out.

there is a company called US Grappling who have been running submission only tournaments for a while in america. They do all experience levels and i remember reading that they produced stats that nearly all matches ended quickly, with an average of about 8 minutes a match (completely random statistic, just going off of memory ). of course there will always be the exception that goes 10/20 minutes.

you do need a ref, because undoubtedly there would have to be rules enforced. no grabbing shorts/tops if it's nogi, no neck cranks or heel hooks (depending on the rule set chosen) and generally just to rule out any other unfair play.

Killme00

Barry et al,

Just a suggestion: If you decide to go with a format of eight invitees and eight qualifiers, how about having two open tournaments between now and the date of the 'event' with four people qualifying from each event. The two qualifying tournaments could be held in two gyms (for example say Pedro Bessa Cork and IP Dublin). There could be a fee of X euro for this which would covers the qualifying costs and any overlay would go toward the overall winners one thousand euro prize. Not only would it help with the funding of the overall prize but it would also give the losers (non-qualifiers) a second chance to qualify.

On another note, I would like to help with the funding and can offer 250 euro towards the prize fund. Its not much but should help. I really want to see this happen.

Regards,
Tom D

r_obric

if this is going to be the top 16 then its easy to draw up the first 12 names, and invite them to compete, if they dont want to then fill the other places and have some reserves on standby.....

the level of people that you want shoulnt require people to go through qualifiers espically brown/black belts.... there isnt that many.

da-bres

you could easily get this televised on a national station. imagine the exposre for the sport. an annual event i think!:)

da-bres

Pitor Kisiel,
Pitor stawski
Paddy Carmody,
Fergal Quinnlan,
Michael Devlin,
Darragh O'Connail,
Owen Roddy,
Tom King,
Arek Sternalski ,
Nergus,
Bartek treter,
Mark Curry,
Andre Ramos,
Wayne Fagan,
Stephen Lowry,
Paul McVeigh,

my 16

Sid_Justice

good list,

chris bowe too?

Joseph...

bernard dunne!!

da-bres

Sid_Justice wrote: »

good list,

chris bowe too?

that would be awesome

arybvtcw0eolkf

Just one more question.. Excuse my ignorance, but why can't the winner's of the various categories in The Irish Open be considered 'The Best'?.

And is it international BJJ practice NOT to have an 'open' category at national competitions?.

As I said, excuse the ignorance but I'm following the discussion with interest.

jitz

First time post but been reading with interest.
I would think you should send out the invites to all the top guys in the country (after all that is who everyone wants to watch) and give them notice of perhaps two months before the tournament is to begin asking whether they want to compete or not with maybe two weeks to reply. If you can fill the 16 spots with those invited then perfect!
If a few signal their intent not to compete or you get no reply within the allotted time frame then organise a sub tournament as killme00 suggests charging X euros to compete. Open to blues upwards and fill the rest of the spots that way...
Also on the issue of funding perhaps charge the competitors 20 euro to enter not to much I wouldn't think for a chance to win 1000. Then charge maybe 6 euro to watch and if you get even 150 spectators (reasonable expectation i would think) that's 900 added to the entrance fees of 320 and killme00s kind donation of 250 then with or without sponsors you should have enough. Plus the money that may or may not be raised or needed from the qualifying tourney depending on how many invites are accepted.
People i would invite would be the following 20 because at least 4 will refuse and i think these are the best guys:
1. Darragh O'Connail
2. Tom King
3. Wayne Fagan
4. Artur Piotrowski
5. Piotr Stawski
6. Clive Staunton
7. Ciaran Toal
8. Graham Keys
9. John Kavanagh
10. Andy Ryan
11. Paddy Carmody
12. Chris Bowe
13. Fergal Quinlan
14. Liam Beechnoir
15. Johnathan McGookin
16. Andre Ramos
17. Arek Sternalski
18. Owen Roddy
19. Paul McVeigh
20. Stephen Lowry

Also ADCC rules ie 10 minute matches with no points scored for the first 5 and if a points draws after the 10 minutess then overtime round of 5 minutes. Gi or no gi would be cool.
This would be one awesome tournament

Richy06

If there needs to be a good poster done up for this, hit me up, my girlfriend is a graphic design student and would love to do it.

Here's her work....
http://rachey-roo.deviantart.com/

As for the TV thing, it'd be very hard to get a national station to cover this. At the end of the day, BJJ is a relatively niche sport, so something like this wouldn't rate hugely. That's what matterd at the end of the day. The best scneario would be to get onto some colleges with media/tv/film production courses to get a doco made as well as having it filmed in a multicam shoot for DVD too. Or if someone was willing to come up with a pitch, maybe a station might bite. I work in TV3 so I could make a connection for someone with the IPU (Internal Production Unit) if ye want, but it'd be a long shot I'd say.

I must say, I'd be excited as hell for this. Whatever the entry fee, I'm there. I do think if it's going to be a BJJ tournament, then it should be Gi.

Barry.Oglesby

Okay lads. Now I will go away and when you hear from me next I will have a format, a venue and will be ready to launch.

Good day to you all.

r_obric

is it to late to say that i was only messing......

arybvtcw0eolkf

So we're gonna have an Irish BJJ 'Best of the Best' comp.. Should be fun for you guys.

Best of luck.

cowzerp

da-bres wrote: »

you could easily get this televised on a national station. imagine the exposre for the sport. an annual event i think!:)

With all due respect this would not happen, there would be no audience to aim for that would make it worthwhile been done by any station..

if the worlds where televised people would not watch in any numbers for example..


will be awesome if it happens, and i would love to see some of the top grapplers that have not been competing in Ireland involved so we could guage the levels of the likes of Darragh, Wayne, Tom etc...

da-bres

cowzerp wrote: »

With all due respect this would not happen, there would be no audience to aim for that would make it worthwhile been done by any station..

if the worlds where televised people would not watch in any numbers for example..

yeah I understand, obviously not as a live event but as richie said documentary format could be a possibility?

NG-DOC

cowzerp wrote: »

will be awesome if it happens, and i would love to see some of the top grapplers that have not been competing in Ireland involved so we could guage the levels of the likes of Darragh, Wayne, Tom etc...

I did the informed performance tournament earlier this year, the nogi irish open and the nogi belfast open.

pretty sure tom did an informed performance one at some stage, the irish open both gi and nogi and the munster open.

EnjoyChoke

cowzerp wrote: »

will be awesome if it happens, and i would love to see some of the top grapplers that have not been competing in Ireland involved so we could guage the levels of the likes of Darragh, Wayne, Tom etc...

Killme00

I would say Cowzer doesnt mean it like it reads. He's prob just not aware how often you guys compete and win in England etc

bjj-fighter

Maybe he means like gauging the levels of Tom, Darragh etc by putting them against competitiors that have been competing abroad like Paddy Carmody. I may be wrong but we'll all find out tomorrow i'm sure ha.

This is one crazy thread! Very entertaining now, the prospect of a competition like this is making me very excited!

David Jones

Also ADCC rules ie 10 minute matches with no points scored for the first 5 and if a points draws after the 10 minutess then overtime round of 5 minutes. Gi or no gi would be cool.

The main problem with ADCC rules is that you get stallers for first 5 mins and then people looking to win on points for a takedown. I was at Barcelona and even from an instructor point of view some of the matches were boring to watch. Jeff Monson is a perfect example of this. I dont care to watch him grapple when the points system is being used.

Submission only is the way to go.

As for the list, some of those listed are students some are instructors. I think you will find most of the students gung ho to compete but I think you will struggle with some of the instructors. Egos do funny things to people at competitions. Especially if you rely on student numbers to pay the bills.

darced

This post has been deleted.

cowzerp

Killme00 wrote: »

I would say Cowzer doesnt mean it like it reads. He's prob just not aware how often you guys compete and win in England etc

I don't mean it as it's been read!
I'm well aware how busy these lads are and how great they are, what I mean is I would like to see them in with thf like of John Kavanagh, Andy Ryan etc..

Barry.Oglesby

Okay I lied I'm back.

With due respect, a lot of guys being mentioned are MMA fighters who, while they may have good grappling games, wouldn't be active in the BJJ/Submission circuit. For this reason, I don't think the likes of Roddy, Maguire etc. would get an automatic place in any tournament and would have to qualify. Some of the names are familiar to me but again, would be guys who only roll in the gym. Awesome as they may be, as a promoter I would be wary of putting someone in who had little or no competitive pedigree. They would have to qualify.

In the next couple of days when some of my Fight Before Christmas backlog dissappears, I'm going to put this together in a coherent format. I'll consult with Dave Jones, Darragh and anyone who has displayed an interest in this and perhaps get in contact with some of our grappling diaspora too.

Much as killme00(Tom D)'s is appreciated I'd prefer to see this funded as a proper venture should be and not reliant on donations. After all, if it goes well, there's no reason not to run it again in 2 years, or a year even.

I'll take all suggestions on board so keep them coming but just FYI I don't run things by committee (nothing gets done that way) so don't be surprised when you don't like some of the stuff I come up with .

David Jones

1 josie murray

2 piotr stawski

3john kavanagh

4 fergal quinlan

5 andy ryan

6 tom maguire

7 tom king

8 tom egan

I can see at least no shows with at least 50% of those and no disrespect to Tom Egan but why would he get a shot in your opinion?

Marty Mc

Very entertaining thread and no doubt this will make for a great competition.

David Jones

Very entertaining thread and no doubt this will make for a great competition.

Very Marty, and Im not suggesting names but I would have thought you might make the list. Some people have very limited memories.

r_obric

David Jones wrote: »

I can see at least no shows with at least 50% of those and no disrespect to Tom Egan but why would he get a shot in your opinion?

What are the criteria for entry? -
Irish person anywhere or anyone living in ireland?

Why not have people express their interest for this if they want to compete, and you will get a list of possible people.

Then ask the top trainers / fighters / coaches / gyms who want to go to it, i would presume that anyone with a brown belt or above is automatically invited and then any purple and below or people in other disciplines have to fight their way in...

Tim_Murphy

Great idea and fair play Barry for looking to organise it.

Hopefully you get guys on board to compete. I'd happily pay to watch this, I'm sure plenty of people would.

darced

This post has been deleted.

r_obric

darced wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

also on merit any fighters won won the advanced divisions in tournaments here in the last 12-18 months should automatically get a place.

Someone like tom king who has been winning everything he has entered here shouldnt need to qualify.

Barry.Oglesby

r_obric wrote: »

also on merit any fighters won won the advanced divisions in tournaments here in the last 12-18 months should automatically get a place.

Someone like tom king who has been winning everything he has entered here shouldnt need to qualify.

This is going to be the pisser. Everyone will have some notion of who should or shouldn't qualify. It's up to me and my council of elders to come up with some equitable system whereby everyone gets a shot and no one feels anyone got a free pass. Equally, we don't want to have guys qualifying as a forgone conclusion. That would be a waste of time.

At the moment I'm thinking this:

6 automatic places- invitees. I know we could come up with a long list of people who deserve it but many won't be interested and that would leave an automatic spot open for someone who maybe doesn't deserve automatic qualification.
8 qualifiers who will qualify in a seeded tournament held in February
2 wild cards selected by a system I've yet to devise

What I have definitely come up with is that the competition will be open to Irish passport holders or those resident in Ireland for a year or more.

Chris89

Wild cards should be decided by a race around the world.

I have no problem organizing this. Anyone who is interested should meet me in trafalgar square at noon tomorrow.

colinlaird000

Guys,

Sounds like a brilliant idea, but possibly cork might be a wee bit of a commute for poor Mark, who looks to be travelling down from Belfast on his own... I'm sure there are a couple who might make the list. Ciaran Toal, Gareth Loye, Graeme Keyes, Peter Lavery, Wacky? I thing Barry is being slightly modest there too I'm sure while not winning the whole thing, would certainly bring some game to the table. Same with Mr Murphy, Cowzer and Doc there. And thats just listing the guys off the top of my head who train formally in the gi. Maybe it would be an idea to do regional tournaments first.. Ulster Munster, Leinster and that other place. and take the top 3 from that. that would give us 12. maybe 4 wild cards as discussed. maybe european / irish open blue purple medallists could duke it out for the other 4 places.
I like the gi idea better. While not as fast, it would add a greater technicality to preceedings. In my opinion.. the 10 minute idea sounds best, submission is obviously the most straightforward way of doing things, but there has to be some fashion of deciding fights when there is no submission after time elapses.

Barry.Oglesby

colinlaird000 wrote: »

? I thing Barry is being slightly modest there too I'm sure while not winning the whole thing, would certainly bring some game to the table.

Thanks for the mention but while I might be drifting around the perimiter, I would only drag down the average in the top 16:). If there's a qualifier (and it looks like there will be) I'll get stuck in though and I'd like to qualify.

David Jones

Tom egan? well its alway interesting to have a wild card in there,
much like the jacare vs randy grappling matches people like to see how a top fighter would fare.

If we are looking for top irish fighter to see "how they would fare" it would be greg loughran.


I still think you will run into difficulty getting anyone who runs a club to take part, save a few people. Otherwise instructors would be entering every Irish open, Nogi and Gi tournament going. Nothing will change that not even 1000 euro to the winner.
I would have each club pick one competitor and a reserve in case there is an injury close to the event, to go forward and represent, in most cases that wont be the club instructor who will no doubt act as coach.

No time limit means the incentive is to finish quickly rather than risk recovery for the next match. It favours the fit, the submission chaser and not the stall and pointer.

Jason McCabe

Ok sort of lost track of this thread.

When and where is the competition? What are the rules? Gi or No Gi?

I don't really enjoy watching straight out grappling matches but this would be interesting.

r_obric

Barry.Oglesby wrote: »

.....

What I have definitely come up with is that the competition will be open to Irish passport holders or those resident in Ireland for a year or more.

not to be pedantic and have any type of North/south debate here but i presume it goes without saying that this is an all island event.....

TEAM RYANO

I think Tom king darragh oconneill
Paddy carmody must be the top 3 active
Bjj players on the seen at the moment
Tom is the Irish number 1 at the moment
He won the purple/ brown belt Irish open
Thus year so we don't need a comp
He must be the number 1
Cheers Andy ryan
Bjj revolution team
Don't mind the spelling of names if I got them
Wrong

David Jones

TEAM RYANO wrote: »

I think Tom king darragh oconneill
Paddy carmody must be the top 3 active
Bjj players on the seen at the moment
Tom is the Irish number 1 at the moment
He won the purple/ brown belt Irish open
Thus year so we don't need a comp
He must be the number 1
Cheers Andy ryan
Bjj revolution team
Don't mind the spelling of names if I got them
Wrong

Agree with all of that Andy. People seem to forget that some of those mentioned are that much older than some of the others. So are we talking best grappler now or back when the instructors were still competing?

MarkFairman

Players like Fergal Quinnlan and Christopher Bowe rarely complete on the domestic scene, however they do in the UK and European Open etc.

Im sure this goes for others also.

jitz

Good to see that this idea is actually starting to take some shape. However I think the best guys should be invited if they don't accept or reply then so be it. Whats great about BJJ is its ability to be live and therefore the best should want to compete although with nothing to prove all participants would improve their games which can only be to their benefit. In my opinion the four best Irish grapplers are JK, Andy Ryan, Graham Keyes and Paddy Carmody so to get all four in the same tournament would be sick and I think that is what this is meant to be a sort of 'best of the best.'

Barry.Oglesby

r_obric wrote: »

not to be pedantic and have any type of North/south debate here but i presume it goes without saying that this is an all island event.....

No. I can't really understand Nordies when they talk so it would cause problems.

TEAM RYANO

Thanks for the mention
But I think myself Jk save jones Liam beachnor
Have had our day
I still do the odd comp but it's in the senior
(oap) section
The guys competing in the adult section
In the big comps Irish open Europeans
Uk major comps and have the time to travel
To train and compete around the world
They are the ones now
Forget about the older guys as like me most
Are coaching or have injuries so you will
Never get them on the mat At the same time
Best of luck with the comp if it goes ahead
Cheers
Andy ryan

Barry.Oglesby

I agree with Andy his zimmer frame would only block the entrance anyway.

Much as everyone would like to see Kavanagh, Ryan, Beechinor et al on the mat I can't see it being a goer. I would prefer to see a bunch of guys who had the time to train professionally or semi-pro for this (we have quite a few of those)

Now some of the old fogies might still fancy it and they'll be welcome, but don't expect it to happen as these guys are busy running gyms, fight teams etc. now as well as training.

Sid_Justice

Have you decided if it's gi or no-gi yet?