Today, it’s almost impossible to imagine combat sports, and grappling in particular, without leg locks. But for much of the history of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, leg attacks were frowned upon in practice and illegal in most competitions. If you asked any of the old school grapplers why, they would merely dismiss them as cheap tricks, nothing any respectable grappler would need to win. Oh, how times have changed.
John Danaher and the Danaher Death Squad—Gordon and Nicky Ryan, Garry, Tonon, Eddie Cummins, and others—have demonstrated the power of lower body attacks to the world by dominated some of the toughest black belts by going after their legs, something many of them were unfamiliar with. There’s an old proverb that says, “Never fight a lion on land, drag him into the sea.” And that is exactly what they did. The legs were completely foreign to most grapplers, unless, of course, they dabbled in Sambo, like the “Boogeyman.”
That was the case of Dean “The Boogeyman” Lister, former BJJ world champion and UFC fighter. Foot locks are as old as martial arts itself. You can even find old Kosen Judo videos on Youtube from the early 1900s with basic footlocks. In the late 1990s, Dean Lister begin to sweep through the competition with his leg attacks. People would refer to him simply as the “Sambo guy.” Dean had developed a system of straight footlocks, heel hooks, and toe holds that ultimately led him to victory in the biggest grappling title in the world in 2003, Adu Dhabi Combat Club absolute world champion.
After Dean’s success, others began to take notice of these new attacks. Little by little, more and more grapplers began to incorporate leg attacks. But it wasn’t until John Danaher and his new leg attack system did it become a mainstay of grappling competition.
In an interview a few years back, John Danaher, a Renzo Gracie blackbelt, recounted a conversation with Dean Lister where Dean said something that Danaher would never forget — “Why would you ignore half the body?” That really resonated with Danaher. It just made perfect sense. Why would you ignore the legs? From that point on, with the rigor of a nuclear physicist, John began to develop his system of leg locks from a variety of leg entanglements. Many of the moves had been around for decades. What John did so brilliantly was that he improved some of techniques, combined others, and built a progression out of them, linking them together.
Now, nearly two decades after Dean Lister took ADCC by storm, no grappling system would be complete without leg attacks.
Check out the Basic Straight Ankle Lock .
More videos from Coach Aleks Rajacic.