Marcus Buchecha Almeida, one of the most prolific and popular heavyweight BJJ world champions recently shared the opinion that in order to call yourself a fighter you need to be good at both Gi and No-Gi Jiu-Jitsu.
Marcus Buchecha Almeida, who has 13 BJJ World Titles to his name (with the Gi), 2 World Titles in No-Gi and 2 ADCC titles (No-Gi) claims that you need to train both with the Gi and without, and even dabble in MMA, not necessarily as professional, if you want to call yourself a real fighter and have the skills of one.
According to Marcus Buchecha:
“I think that a real fighter needs to fight in the gi and no-gi. And you can, you need to test yourself in MMA, right? To see how your Jiu-Jitsu is going to be in a real situation. I mean, that’s how I see it.
Of course, MMA is not for everyone, a lot of people don’t like it. But I think the gi and no-gi should be, like… You should fight in both, period. And that’s my opinion.”
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The extraordinary grappler has been fighting professionally in MMA since 2020, and has
a 4-0 record in ONE FC.
His statement is correct and helps settle the needless debate about whether Gi or No-Gi Jiu-Jitsu is better/more efficient.
Many big names from the BJJ community reacted to Marcus Buchecha Almeida’s statement. Garry Tonon, for example, had this to say about Buchecha’s claim through his Instagram account, responding in his usual style:
“Why stop there? A real fighter must compete in k1, judo, sambo, wrestling, Muay Thai, ping pong, combat jiu jitsu, catch wrestling, pancration, karate, hopscotch, kravmaga, taekwondo, boxing, aikido, tai chi, synchronized swimming, sumo,wing chun, lethwei, badminton…..
It’s really cool for people to successfully compete in multiple martial arts, but I don’t really see a need to suggest someone isn’t a “real” anything just because they choose to specialize in one martial art.
There are a ton of boxers I could heel hook in 15 seconds that never did MMA or grappling. But for God sakes, they are still “real” fighters and I would never try to suggest they aren’t just because they only choose to compete in a specific ruleset.”
What do you think?
