Team switching in Jiu-Jitsu is a very controversial topic that will always provoke different points of views and arguments among the BJJ community. Throughout Jiu-Jitsu history, there have always been individuals that have gone their own way, leaving their initial team or master, to either join another team or create their own. This is what many people know as “Creontes”. If you think about it, the majority of BJJ players and competitors could be considered “creontes” unless they were with just one academy their whole lives. When it comes to switching teams, everybody has their own reasons for doing so. It can be because of a disagreement on teaching style, involve money, location etc.. One thing that history has taught us is that whenever small teams break off, eventually more new teams will break off from that new team (for ex:Alliance> Brasa> Checkmat…).
Kron Gracie will be facing UFC vet Cub Swanson in the UFC on October 12th at the Amalie Arena in in Tampa, Florida.
Swanson has disclosed that because of Kron’s famous last name, he has received backlash from a few Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu academies. Swanson is himself a black belt under Rigan Machado.
Swanson said in a recent episode of UFC Unfiltered (transcript by MMA Junkie):
“I’ve been able to get a lot of jiu-jitsu in because he’s a Gracie, and he has the name. It’s been an interesting one,”. “I’ve been kicked out of a couple of jiu-jitsu schools because of the respect. They don’t want to train somebody that isn’t a Gracie, which really pisses me off.”
Kron was asked that on a recent interview on MMA Junkie and he believes that Swanson should have stayed with his team:
“The way I grew up in training and fighting martial arts is basically you have a clan and a team, and you’re with your team forever. If you leave your team, you’re [a] traitor. That’s the way I grew up. I have this instilled in me, and no matter what’s going on with me or my team, that’s my team. I don’t… get to just pick and choose as I go along with this career, whether it’s jiu-jitsu or whether it’s fighting. In the old times of war, you had a clan, and you can’t just go, ‘I didn’t like this clan this time; I’m going to go somewhere else.”
There are also people that cross train at various BJJ academies at the same time, in order to maximize their training.
Kron’ famous father, Rickson Gracie, obviously formed his son’s opinion . Here is what he has to say about simultaneously training at different Jiu-Jitsu Academies:
