Hi guys, I'm new here. Just throwing in my two cents...
A lot of people are tossing around their martial arts resumes and claiming to know more than everyone else. My resume isn't very impressive so I won't do that.
But I have a lot of respect for BJJ. We've all seen what it can do in the octagon. From the little of it I know, I'd say it focuses intensively on getting a submission, which is why it's so successful. I've never had a real class of BJJ in my life; I learn the techniques by reading about them and watching videos. Before you start telling me that won't work... well, it does. My regular grappling buddy is fifty pounds heavier than me and an experienced wrestler who tried to learn BJJ the same way I did. He's in way better shape and (obviously) way stronger than I am, but I still beat him about half the time. Maybe I'm a special case, but the point I'm making is this: with
nothing but the knowledge of a few BJJ techniques and my natural fight instinct I can beat bigger, stronger, faster opponents who have more training than me. So does BJJ work? Yes. Is it the best/most practical grappling art? There's no way to say.
You want an example from "real life"? I have one. Sort of. It's not an attempted mugging, but it's something.
I started dating a new girl recently and she invited some of her friends to our university to hang out. We were all walking down the hall way and her and one of her guy friends were play-wrestling. Jokingly, I told her to "tag" me, and when she did, grabbed the guy's head loosely. In response, he picked me up onto his shoulder.
I'm really not a big guy-- 150 lbs. I have alot of buddies that are bigger than me, so I'm used to getting picked up when we're playfighting or sport fighting. But the situation here went differently. What I didn't know about this guy I just met is that he's trained in CSW, incredibly competitive and likes people to be scared of him. I believe he wanted to make an impression on me. He weighs 170 lbs, and is a mass of muscle and energy. I was comfortable with him picking me up, but then things went sour.
He dropped me in a full-on body slam on the concrete floor. I realized halfway down he wasn't going to "catch" me, so I used my underhook-overhook combination to bear hug him and landed flat on my back to minimize the damage. When he realized I wasn't going to give up he tried to pick me up and slam me into the wall, but I had sank a guillotine choke and before he could lift me he was pounding the floor, gasping for air.
So it's not a street fight, but this is an example of a real-life scenario where a bigger, stronger, better fighter was actually trying to hurt me. And he did hurt me. My chest and back felt compacted for the next two days and I was short of breath for several hours. But I could have killed him with the guillotine, simple as that.
My answer: BJJ can be practical in a real fight if you use it at the right time, in the right way. But that doesn't mean you should go for a double leg if someone pulls a knife on you.
Hope I didn't bore everyone too much. In recent years I've become a really peaceful guy who just likes fighting, but when I was a kid I had a horrible temper. I used to fight every bully and punk on the playground, and I never lost. If you want me to pull some of
those stories out (they're interesting, since I didn't know any technique at the time), just say the word. I like writing