BJJ TECHNIQUES

Baseball Bat Choke – Effective and Highly Powerful Choke

If you’re a BJJ practitioner, then you know that there is a variety of chokes that you can perform on your opponents. There are many other moves and submissions that you could do, but the chokes are consistently among the most popular moves that people tend to make on the mats. That being said, the baseball bat choke is one of the most powerful moves that you can execute.

There is a reason as to why the baseball bat choke is one of the most frequently used chokes in BJJ. Well, now you too can begin using this choke to your advantage. And by knowing how to execute this choke – you will also learn how to defend yourself from it. Do the work on the mats and pretty soon you will begin to see that you are consistently tapping out your opponents with the baseball bat choke. Below you will find some more information about how to set up this move properly and how to use it to consistently finish your opponents on the mats.

The core of the baseball bat choke

This is a blood choke that will put your opponent to sleep if he doesn’t tap out in time. This makes this move far less dangerous than the moves that can cripple your opponents. Just make sure that you don’t overdo it and let your opponent go if you can see that he has fallen asleep.

All you need to do to perform this choke is place your hands and arms in a particular way around your opponent’s throat. You need to slide your thumb inside the collar of your opponent’s gi and under his neck. Then you need to slide your other hand into the inside of your opponent’s gi – your thumb sticking out. All you need to do now is to press your arms together and create a huge pressure on your opponent’s throat. This will lead either to a tap out or to your opponent falling asleep.

Positions from which to execute the baseball bat choke

There are a few positions that you can execute this choke from. The first position – and most frequently used – is side control. This position is used for purposes of demonstration of this choke – you will be able to see it very often on the mats. And the way to execute this move from side control is very simple – just get into side control and follow the instructions from the previous paragraph.

Another useful position from which you can execute this move is bottom side-control. You may think that your opponent is very superior to you if he has top side control position – but this is not the case. You will be able to execute the baseball bat choke from the bottom position and choke your opponent from there – even if he has a somewhat more dominant position. Slide your fingers and hands in and you will be able to perform the baseball bat choke on your opponent. Unless he defends, he will fall asleep.

A no-gi variant of the baseball bat choke

You may have thought that this is a move that you can execute only if your opponent is wearing a gi. But this is not the case. You can also execute a variant of this move even if your opponent doesn’t wear a gi. The sole difference here is that you will have to use your hands for clinching your opponent’s neck – you won’t be able to perform this choke by sliding your fingers and hands in your opponent’s gi. A great demonstration of this move from the bottom side control position can be observed in the following video:

Defending the baseball bat choke

All is fine and well when it comes to executing the move. But what happens if your opponent tries to do this move on you? Well, you need to act quickly if you are to survive. Surviving BJJ chokes comes down to skills and to genetics as well. Depending on your personal genetics, you may have a very strong or resistant neck. This will make you very hard to choke out.

But even if you don’t have any genetic endowments when it comes to your neck and BJJ, you can still use skills to defend yourself. If you can sense your opponent mounting a baseball bat choke, then you can easily disrupt his plans by inserting your hand in-between his arms so that you can block the choke. Also, if you sniff out your opponent’s intention to use this choke – you will be able to react in time and dispose of his hands. However, it will be very difficult to survive this choke if your opponent has executed it – it will take a few seconds and you will go to sleep. Don’t be ashamed to tap out.

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