Grappling Report: Full teams for Polaris Squads 3 revealed
A rundown of the biggest headlines and news from the world of competitive grappling.
We’re just a little over two months away from the next installment of the latest revolution in team grappling, Polaris Squads 3. This time there’s a slight change in the teams themselves as Team UK & Ireland will return, but this time facing off against Team USA. It was only a month ago that the promotion announced the two team captains who will be leading their squad out onto the mats as Darragh O’Connaill and JT Torres respectively.
Announcements have come thick and fast since then, and now both eight-man teams have been revealed in full. With elite 10th Planet representatives Richie ‘Boogieman’ Martinez, PJ Barch, and Jon ‘Thor’ Blank alongside prodigies like William Tackett and Kade Ruotolo, Team USA is the favorite. It won’t be easy however as Polaris triple champion Ashley Williams and Combat Jiu Jitsu World Champion Tom Halpin are among those looking to stop them.
Kayla Harrison en route to yet another million-dollar cheque at PFL
It only took three years for Kayla Harrison to go from winning her second Judo Olympic gold medal to being crowned the winner of PFL’s 2019 season. Now with plenty more fights under her belt than when she made her start for the promotion, she was already a strong favorite to defend her title this year. This week at PFL 3, she proved exactly why fans have such high expectations of her and looked eager to make good on them.
She put her perfect 8-0 record on the line against Mariana Morais in the opening round of the season and took just a little over a minute to crush the 27-fight veteran. This win put her at the top of the promotion’s standings alongside Larissa Pacheco so she’s already in prime position to qualify for the tournament finals. From there, it seems increasingly unlikely that any of the 145lb women PFL have to offer can stand in her way.
Full results for the event can be found here.
Several elite prodigies set to compete at Who’s Number One
The next WNO event is starting to take shape with a little under three weeks to go before it takes place and it seems like the promotion is eager to put young stars front and center. The younger of Brazilian Fight Factory’s most successful brothers, Andrew Tackett, will be taking on Dream Art Brown Belt Mica Galvao in a battle between two phenomenal grapplers who aren’t even old enough to celebrate with a beer after their fight.
AOJ’s first teenage black belt Jessa Khan will also be taking on a huge challenge in the form of Pati Fontes, while her teammate Johnatha Alves makes his black belt no gi debut against Danaher Death Squad member Oliver Taza. The main event sees fellow Puerto Rico resident Gordon Ryan taking on Luis Panza, shortly after Mikey Musumeci and Vagner Rocha compete against Lucas Pinheiro and Josh Hinger respectively.
Gordon Ryan makes an appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience
It was only a matter of time before this happened, but Gordon Ryan has finally made an appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience. It made perfect sense considering the fact that his coach John Danaher has made several appearances on the world’s most popular podcast, and both he and Joe Rogan himself have consistently sung the praises of the main they both agree is the pound-for-pound greatest no gi grappler around.
The podcast itself lasted a little under three hours and the pair talked about a number of topics, including the now-infamous altercation between Ryan and ATOS founder Andre Galvao backstage at WNO. The majority of the episode was spent discussing various facets of Jiu-Jitsu and related areas, although they did also discuss Ryan’s recent signing to ONE FC where he downplayed the rumours of a potential transition to MMA.
Quick Hits
- High Rollerz have just announced the theme for their upcoming tournament, which will be a ‘Cops vs Stonerz’ event featuring current active members of the police.
- Nick Diaz has joined force with Stripchat, an adult webcam site, to teach a self-defense seminar to some of their female workers.
- NCAA All-American Pat Downey is set to compete in professional BJJ again in the upcoming Third Coast Grappling Middleweight Grand Prix.
- Fabricio Werdum is set to appeal his controversial knockout loss at PFL 3 as footage appears to confirm that his opponent tapped out just seconds prior to winning the fight.