Sherdog’s Top 10: Jiu-Jitsu Players in MMA

Mike SloanApr 06, 2016

10. Nick Diaz

He has become known and revered as a tough-as-nails brawler willing to get hit just so he can fire back with harder shots of his own. Love him or hate him, Diaz has a long established reputation as one of the most exciting fighters to ever compete in MMA.

A trash talker of the highest ilk, Diaz loves to stand and trade punches, and he appears to be at his most joyful when inflicting substantial pain on his opponents. However, he is a jiu-jitsu player at heart, and his skills on the ground rank among the best in the sport, even though he has scored almost twice as many knockouts as submissions as a professional mixed martial artist.

Diaz does not have a stellar jiu-jitsu and submission grappling resume, though he holds the rank of black belt under Cesar Gracie. However, his jiu-jitsu game in MMA has proven as deadly as anyone’s, as he has submitted Hayato Sakurai, Scott Smith, Evangelista Santos and Takanori Gomi, the latter the result of a gogoplata and widely regarded as one of the greatest submissions in MMA history.

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