Gordon Ryan: Portrait of the King of No-Gi Grappling

Some athletes dominate their sport. And then there is Gordon Ryan, who rewrote his. One hundred and two wins, five losses, six years without a defeat. An ADCC absolute belt taken from André Galvão. Then a career stopped at 30 by a stomach that would no longer cooperate. Portrait of a king who left the throne standing, before ending up on the floor in Krakow under the fists of a dozen Kazakhs.

Las Vegas, September 18, 2022. Gordon Ryan has just won the +99 kg division at ADCC by submitting Nick Rodriguez in the final. Most athletes would go back to the hotel. He, however, demanded a second match the same weekend: the superfight for the absolute belt, against André Galvão. The Atos boss has held that title since 2011. The match lasts under ten minutes. Ryan takes the back, locks his rear naked choke and Galvão taps. Nobody had ever won a weight division and the superfight belt in the same year. That night, the debate over the greatest no-gi grappler in history was therefore closed. Gordon Ryan was 27.

This portrait covers the whole journey. First the New Jersey garbage collector turned prodigy, then the meeting with John Danaher. Next the leg lock revolution, the three ADCCs and the illness that stopped everything. Finally, that Sunday in September 2026 when the retired king threw himself into a matside brawl to defend his student.

Gordon Ryan at a glance

Gordon Ryan’s origins: a New Jersey kid who collected garbage

Gordon Ryan was born on July 8, 1995 in Monroe, New Jersey. Nothing pointed him toward grappling: no wrestler father, no family dojo, no college championship past. He discovered jiu-jitsu at 15 with a local instructor, Miguel Benitez. Then Tom DeBlass, one of the most respected grapplers on the East Coast, took over his training. A few months later, as a four-stripe white belt, he met Garry Tonon. Tonon was then a young brown belt and DeBlass’s most promising student. The two became friends. Then, when Tonon started teaching at Brunswick BJJ, Ryan joined his classes.

The detail people often forget is that Gordon Ryan was, for a long time, a practitioner like any other, with a day job on the side. In 2015 he was still a garbage collector. Yet that was the year, as a brown belt, when he decided to bet everything on the mat. He quit his job, won the Newaza Challenge, then the IBJJF No-Gi Worlds at his belt. His six-month run convinced everyone. So in February 2016, Garry Tonon awarded him his black belt, a first for Tonon as a teacher. DeBlass, Ricardo Almeida and John Danaher were present, and Danaher co-signed the promotion.

Meeting John Danaher: the absolute turning point

From purple belt onward, Ryan travelled regularly to New York to train under John Danaher at the Renzo Gracie Academy. Danaher is a singular character. A New Zealander, former philosophy student at Columbia and nightclub bouncer turned coach, he teaches jiu-jitsu the way you build a proof. No piling up of isolated techniques, but complete systems in which each position leads to the next. His elite group, the Danaher Death Squad, then included Garry Tonon, Eddie Cummings and Nicky Ryan. Craig Jones and Nick Rodriguez arrived later.

Ryan himself has placed his breakthrough in that period, between brown and black belt. Indeed, that was when he began beating established ADCC champions in the gym. The relationship quickly went beyond coach and athlete. Danaher found in Ryan the ideal subject to validate his theories. Ryan, for his part, found in Danaher the intellectual framework he had been missing. Ten years later, despite two relocations and a team that blew apart, the two men have never stopped working together.

Gordon Ryan’s rise: from EBI to ADCC in eighteen months

His first year as a black belt looked like a demonstration. In April 2016 he won EBI 6 in the absolute. Along the way he beat Yuri Simoes, a gi world champion and future two-time ADCC winner. He then took EBI 8 (-84 kg) the same year, followed by EBI 11 (-77 kg) and EBI 14 (absolute) in 2017. Four Eddie Bravo Invitational tournaments in three different divisions. In between, he also submitted Keenan Cornelius with a heel hook in a superfight. The American submission-only circuit had therefore found its star. His stage name, “The Iron Dragon”, soon became “The King”, a title he gave himself.

What stands out in those first two years is also his losses, because there were some. First a Grappling Industries final lost on points to Tex Johnson. Then a superfight lost by rear naked choke to Felipe Pena in 2016. Finally a 4-0 defeat to Leandro Lo in a superfight at the 2017 ADCC Trials. These setbacks have documentary value. They show an athlete still vulnerable to the points game. The Danaher system would fix that, match after match.

2017: ADCC as a global revelation

The ADCC Submission Fighting World Championship is the most prestigious competition in grappling. It takes place every two years. In September 2017 in Espoo, Finland, Ryan arrived at 22 in the -88 kg division, seen as an outsider. He first beat Dillon Danis, then choked Romulo Barral. Next, he got past Xande Ribeiro in the semifinal. Finally, he submitted Keenan Cornelius in the final with a mounted guillotine. ADCC world champion at his first attempt.

He did not stop there, though, and entered the absolute the next day. He submitted Roberto “Cyborg” Abreu with a heel hook. Then he choked his own teammate Craig Jones, and after that Mahamed Aly. In the final, however, he fell to Felipe Pena, 6-0. Gold and silver at a first ADCC: Kingsway now calls it the best debut in the event’s history. For the global community, the question was therefore no longer “who is this kid?” but “who can stop him?”.

2018-2019: the clean sweep and the double

2018 was the year he took over the IBJJF no-gi circuit. At the No-Gi Pans, he won his division and the absolute, every win by submission, including Kaynan Duarte in the final. At the No-Gi Worlds, he doubled again, notably with an 11-0 over Yuri Simoes in the semifinal. In between, he led Team Alpha Male to victory at Quintet 3 in Japan. There he submitted Josh Barnett, Marcos Souza, Craig Jones and Vitor Shaolin one after another. Yet his last career loss dates from that same year: a points decision against Vinny Magalhães at ACB 13. He would never lose again.

In September 2019, ADCC returned to Anaheim and Ryan moved up to -99 kg. He first choked Ben Hodgkinson and Tim Spriggs. He then beat Lucas “Hulk” Barbosa 3-0, before submitting Vinicius “Trator” Ferreira in the final. In the absolute, he went through Pedro Marinho (heel hook), his friend Garry Tonon and Lachlan Giles. In the final he met Marcus “Buchecha” Almeida, thirteen-time gi world champion. The match was tight, 0-0 after overtime. It was therefore decided on penalties, in Ryan’s favor. The weight-and-absolute double, achieved before him by a handful of legends, entered his record at 24.

2022: the night in Las Vegas

Between 2019 and 2022, Ryan went through a difficult period we will come back to: illness, temporary retirement, the Death Squad breakup. Yet when he arrived at ADCC 2022 in Las Vegas, he had picked up where he left off. Jacob Couch and Pedro Marinho were beaten at WNO. Then Felipe Pena, his old rival, verbally tapped in a superfight in 2022. Revenge for the two losses of 2016 and 2017 was therefore complete.

In Las Vegas he was scheduled for a single match: the superfight against André Galvão for the absolute belt. He nevertheless asked promoter Mo Jassim to also enter the +99 kg division. An unprecedented request, but it was granted. He first choked Heikki Jussila, then beat Victor Hugo 8-0. Next, he submitted Roosevelt Sousa, then Nick Rodriguez with an outside heel hook in the final. The following day, finally, he choked Galvão. The first athlete in history to win a weight division and the absolute superfight in the same year. He was not yet 28.

2024: the last matches, with no training camp

ADCC 2024, at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, was his final appearance. He fought two superfights in two days. First Felipe Pena, beaten 2-0. Then Yuri Simoes, crushed 21-0 for the absolute belt. We would learn later that he had not been able to train hard since January 2024. In his own words, he was operating at a fraction of his capacity. Yet the 21-0 over a two-time ADCC champion remains, to this day, the last image of Gordon Ryan the competitor.

Gordon Ryan’s record: the numbers of a reign

The story above sets the rhythm. The raw numbers, however, deserve their own box. To compare with other reigns in BJJ history, see our portraits of Marcelo Garcia and Roger Gracie. Those are the two names that come up most often in the greatest-of-all-time debate.

Gordon Ryan’s game: a system, not a collection of techniques

What sets Gordon Ryan apart from almost all his contemporaries is that his game is not a catalog of brilliant moves. On the contrary, it is a system designed from end to end. Each position leads to the next, and each submission fits into a hierarchy of threats. If you are trying to build your own style, his path is a textbook case. He first started as a heel hook and kimura trap specialist. Then he expanded piece by piece, until there were no holes left.

The back: 32 rear naked chokes in his career

Back control is the most dominant position in jiu-jitsu, and Ryan made it his territory. He can get there from anywhere. Above all, he can stay there under constant pressure and chain choke attempts with surgical precision. His rear naked choke is the most basic submission in BJJ. Yet it is in reality a mechanism of extreme finesse: arm angle, head pressure, hip control, timing of the finish. Thus, thirty-two of his eighty-two black belt submissions are rear naked chokes, Galvão and Barral included.

Leg locks: the Death Squad revolution

With Danaher, Tonon and Eddie Cummings, Ryan was one of the architects of the leg attack revolution in modern no-gi. The Death Squad system made methodical what had until then been marginal. First the entries from guard. Then the control positions, such as ashi garami and the saddle. Then the hierarchy of finishes, and above all the heel hook, long considered too dangerous to teach. Nineteen of his career submissions are heel hooks. Cornelius, Cyborg, Marinho and Nick Rodriguez, in the ADCC 2022 final, were notably among the victims.

His contribution also goes beyond the mat. Through his instructionals, the best sellers on BJJ Fanatics, he spread an understanding of leg locks that transformed no-gi worldwide. Academies everywhere integrated these concepts. The heel hook rule eventually changed as a result. It has been allowed in IBJJF no-gi since 2021 for brown and black belts, whereas it was banned across the board a few years earlier.

Passing: domination from the top

Reduced to his image as a back and leg specialist, Ryan is nevertheless one of the best passers of his generation. His passing combines body lock, knee slice and leg drag. Above all, his reading of the opponent’s reactions lets him turn every defense into an entry on the legs or the back. That completeness is what sets him apart. Most champions build their dominance on one or two strengths. He developed a game with no obvious gap, including on the feet. His instructionals on wrestling and the front headlock are in fact evidence of late but serious work there.

Defense: the piece nobody looks at

Ryan has often explained that his confidence came first from his escapes. As a brown belt, he realized he was almost impossible to pin or submit in the gym. That was the day he started believing he could be the best in the world. In ten years as a black belt, he has in fact been submitted only once, by Pena in 2016. His “Pillars of Defense” series on BJJ Fanatics covers pin escapes, choke escapes and leg lock escapes. It is probably the least spectacular part of his catalog. Yet it is the most useful for an amateur practitioner.

Gordon Ryan, Danaher, GSP and the Austin laboratory

To understand Gordon Ryan, you have to understand the ecosystem he was built in. The Renzo Gracie Academy in New York, in the 2010s, was a unique place. John Danaher trained both the Death Squad grapplers and top MMA fighters there, including Georges St-Pierre and Chris Weidman. GSP is a jiu-jitsu black belt and often cited as the greatest MMA fighter in history. He has been a Danaher student since the 2000s. He never stopped training after retiring. So he regularly rolled with Ryan: in New York, in Puerto Rico in 2021, then in Austin in 2022.

The Canadian’s verdict says it all, because he has also shared the mat with Roger Gracie and Braulio Estima: “It’s like grappling with a gorilla. He’s the best guy I’ve ever rolled with.” In January 2022, the three men also spent more than three hours together on Lex Fridman’s podcast. It is one of the most listened-to episodes ever devoted to grappling. Ryan explains there how his confidence was built on evidence accumulated in the gym, not on talk.

July 2021: the Death Squad blows up

In July 2021, the team had settled in Puerto Rico during the pandemic. That is where John Danaher announced the end of the Danaher Death Squad. He cited the location of a future school, personality conflicts and conflicting values. He also mentioned the tension between the team brand and the members’ individual brands. Craig Jones, Nick Rodriguez, Ethan Crelinsten and Nicky Ryan, Gordon’s own brother, therefore left to found B-Team in Austin. Danaher, Ryan, Tonon and Oliver Taza set up in the same city under the name New Wave Jiu-Jitsu.

The start was rough: a depleted team, no gym, a sick star considering retirement. Yet new athletes arrived, notably Giancarlo Bodoni, Nicholas Meregali and Luke Griffith. The group then gave itself a year to prepare for ADCC 2022. The result is known. Later, in April 2025, New Wave was rebranded Kingsway Jiu-Jitsu. Finally, in the summer of 2025, Ryan opened his own gym in Austin, with Danaher and Tonon as co-founders. For the first time, the king had a physical kingdom.

Gordon Ryan and illness: a career built against his own body

The record takes on another dimension when you know the conditions it was built in. In 2018, recurring staph infections, common among grapplers, led to repeated courses of antibiotics. His gut flora never recovered. He then developed severe digestive problems. They were first diagnosed as gastroparesis, then attributed to bacterial and yeast overgrowth. Nausea, vomiting, an inability to eat normally. He spoke about it publicly under the name “Belly Ache Chronicles”. That candor, in fact, earned him a form of respect even among his critics.

In May 2021 he announced a first retirement, unable to maintain a decent training level. Yet he returned a year later for ADCC 2022, which he dominated as if he had never been away. But from January 2024 onward, he could no longer train or lift hard without vomiting. His two ADCC 2024 superfights were therefore fought with no camp. He won them anyway.

February 2026: “I am done”

On February 16, 2026, ten years to the day after his black belt, Gordon Ryan posted a long message on Instagram. He wrote that the day marked ten years at black belt, ten years on top of the sport, and “the probable end to my competitive career”. Gordon then detailed the evolution of his illness. He specified that his body was otherwise healthy and that his technical skills had never been sharper. Then he concluded: “For now, I can confidently say, I am done.” Gordon Ryan was 30. Three days earlier, however, he had still been talking about a return at ADCC 2026.

Ambiguity is part of the character. A few weeks after the announcement, videos showed him rolling at Kingsway. He also still leaves the door ajar should the medical problem ever be solved. But the competitive reality is clear. Since May 2025, WNO had already stripped him of its no-gi world championship belt, without a loss, for not defending it. He is therefore not at ADCC 2026 as an athlete. His 21-0 over Simoes remains his last match.

Gordon Ryan in Krakow, September 12, 2026: the king in the brawl

Gordon Ryan was indeed at the Tauron Arena in Krakow for ADCC 2026, the first held in Europe since 2017. But he was in the corner, as a Kingsway coach. On day one, his student Dorian Olivarez, one of the favorites at -66 kg, faced Kazakhstan’s Bekzat Kapashov in the round of 16. The match was electric. First, Kapashov bit Olivarez’s hand during a choke attempt. Olivarez answered with a slap. The referee restarted the match, and Olivarez ended up submitting his opponent.

After the handshake, some fifteen members of the Kazakh delegation went after Olivarez, his father Mike and John Danaher. Ryan, meanwhile, was coaching Dominic Mejia on the next mat. He saw the numbers mismatch and crossed over. He was immediately tackled to the floor, punched by several men, then kicked. Officials finally managed to separate everyone after about a minute. He got up and went back to coaching his match. Later, he posted his version in a video. In it he called the scuffle the best fight of the night and thanked “the Kazakh guys for the scrap”.

The sanction came right away. Olivarez and Kapashov were disqualified and banned for one year by ADCC. Olivarez’s father was banned from coaching for two years, and Owen Jones took the vacant spot in the bracket. No serious injuries, but an image that went around the world within hours. It sums up the character rather well, in fact. A 31-year-old retiree, the biggest record in the event’s history, throwing himself into a three-against-fifteen melee. All so as not to leave his coach and his student alone.

The character: provocateur, businessman, teacher

Gordon Ryan never tried to be liked. He proclaimed himself king. He also fed public rivalries with Felipe Pena, Craig Jones, André Galvão and B-Team. Moreover, his positions on social media, on jiu-jitsu or any other subject, have regularly divided the community. He owns it: criticism energizes him, he says, and serves as fuel. That mix of extraordinary talent and appetite for confrontation made him the most talked-about grappling athlete in history. That is no small thing for a sport played in front of a few hundred people when he started.

He also understood before anyone else the economic value of his position. His BJJ Fanatics catalog holds more than fifty titles. It is the largest of any instructor on the platform, and one of the pillars of his business model. He likewise signed with ONE Championship in 2021, then debuted on UFC Fight Pass in 2022 against Nick Rodriguez. Finally, he worked as a grappling coach for Jon Jones ahead of his fight with Stipe Miocic. What Gordon Ryan proved, beyond the medals, is that a grappler could fill arenas and sell systems. In short, make a very good living from his art without going through MMA.

Gordon Ryan’s legacy: a before and an after

Ryan’s influence goes far beyond his results. Before the Death Squad, leg locks were a curiosity reserved for a few specialists. Today they are part of the core curriculum in most serious academies, and the rulebooks have followed. No-gi was long considered the poor relation of the gi. With him, it gained comparable, if not greater, prestige in the eyes of part of the community. The explosion in grappling’s audience since 2018, of which UFC BJJ is the most visible consequence, therefore owes a lot to his ability to generate anticipation around every match.

In terms of method, he established the idea that jiu-jitsu is learned through principles and systems, by explaining the why before the how. That approach is inherited from Danaher. It has been spread to hundreds of thousands of practitioners through his instructionals. Thus, it changed the way an entire generation thinks about and teaches the sport. And the story continues by proxy: in Krakow, his Kingsway students were on the mats, with him in the corner.

FAQ: Gordon Ryan

How many ADCC titles has Gordon Ryan won? Three division titles (2017 at -88 kg, 2019 at -99 kg, 2022 at +99 kg) and one absolute tournament title (2019). He also holds two absolute superfight belts (2022 against André Galvão, 2024 against Yuri Simoes), plus an absolute silver medal in 2017. He is therefore the only athlete to have won a weight division and the absolute superfight in the same year.

Why did Gordon Ryan retire? He announced his retirement on February 16, 2026, at 30. The cause was chronic digestive problems that appeared in 2018 after courses of antibiotics for staph infections. He explained he had been unable to train intensely since January 2024. Gordon Ryan nevertheless remains an instructor at Kingsway Jiu-Jitsu in Austin.

Who is Gordon Ryan’s coach? John Danaher, former coach at the Renzo Gracie Academy in New York and of Georges St-Pierre. Ryan has worked with him since purple belt. His black belt, however, was awarded in February 2016 by Garry Tonon, with Danaher as co-signer. His first instructors were Miguel Benitez and Tom DeBlass.

What is Gordon Ryan’s competition record? According to BJJ Heroes, 102 wins, 5 losses and 3 draws at black belt, with 82 wins by submission (80%). His losses date from 2016 to 2018 (Tex Johnson, Felipe Pena, Leandro Lo, Felipe Pena, Vinny Magalhães). After that, he remained undefeated from 2019 to 2024.

What happened with Gordon Ryan at ADCC 2026? On September 12, 2026 in Krakow, a brawl broke out matside after his student Dorian Olivarez beat Bekzat Kapashov. Ryan, present as a coach, stepped in against the Kazakh delegation and took punches on the ground. Olivarez and Kapashov were then disqualified and banned for one year by ADCC.

Is Gordon Ryan the greatest grappler of all time? In no-gi, the consensus is broad: three ADCC titles in three different divisions, two absolute belts, six years without a loss and 80% of wins by submission. The all-time debate across both formats, on the other hand, remains open with Roger Gracie and Marcelo Garcia, who dominated in the gi with the same authority.

Conclusion: the king is gone, the system remains

Gordon Ryan did not get the exit the greats are supposed to get. No announced last fight, no farewell tour. Just an Instagram post on a Monday in February, and a body that said stop before the mind did. Yet that is what makes his story unique. The densest record in grappling history was built, for half of it, by a sick athlete.

What will remain, beyond the titles, is an idea he embodied better than anyone. Jiu-jitsu is mastered through intelligence as much as athleticism, and the system comes before the isolated technique. In the history of Brazilian jiu-jitsu, there will therefore be a before and an after Gordon Ryan. Not only because he won, but because he changed the way the whole world thinks about the sport. For more on the ADCC format that suited him so well, our legends section and rules guides are the place to start.

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