most/least effective chokes.

teamventure09

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in your opinions which chokes are most effective and ends up less like a neck crank most often? out of these head n arm chokes:

howdy choke
arm triangle
anaconda
darce

obviosuly the rear naked and triangle are highly effective so i'm less concerned with them.
 
What is a howdy choke?

it's a head n arm choke from side control. it's like the arm triangle but using opponents other arm. there must be another name for this choke cause you're the second person who's asked me this today. anybody know other names for the howdy?
 
IMO:

1. D'arce
2. Anaconda
3. arm triangle
4. Howdy- which I think is really difficult to get on properly. I have never choked someone with it and I have never even been close to being choked myself.
 
IMO:

1. D'arce
2. Anaconda
3. arm triangle
4. Howdy- which I think is really difficult to get on properly. I have never choked someone with it and I have never even been close to being choked myself.

yeah i've heard people say that the howdy isn't all that effective. i've got some guys with it though. it's usually the anaconda i'll miss though.
 
I would say...it depends on which head and arm finish you use.

So!

1. Arm Triangle S-Grip
2. D'arce
3. Arm Triangle Gable
4. Anaconda
5. Arm Triangle Figure-Four
6. Howdy

...yeah, I overcomplicate things a lot.

Just my opinion!

Take care,

Oli

[Edit: To clarify, I'm referring to how 'clean' the choke is. Rather than necessarily how likely you might catch each technique.]
 
in your opinions which chokes are most effective and ends up less like a neck crank most often? out of these head n arm chokes:

howdy choke
arm triangle
anaconda
darce

obviosuly the rear naked and triangle are highly effective so i'm less concerned with them.

Ahhhh *cracks knuckles* this thread has my name all over it.

I'm assuming by the Howdy choke you mean the Walsh/Monty Phyton (all stupid names) or the arm-triangle Guillotine?

The Peruvian Necktie is one too.

In terms of the neck crank with these chokes, you have to keep a couple things in mind. None of these chokes are neck cranks, although they may put some pressure on the neck, depending on if your opponent's neck is smaller or if you change the angle/pressure of the choke.

Even then, the pressure isn't enough to make it a crank. At least not a crank the way the canopener is a crank. You're never gonna herniate a disk with a Darce, but you can with a canopener, etc.

In judging the effectiveness, you have (in my mind) three basic criteria:

1. Versatility/ease of setups
2. Versatility/ease of finishes
3. The structural power of the arm triangle.

I'll go through the 3 basic ones:

Arm Triangle
Usually the first head-and-arm choke people learn.
1. The setups tend to be very easy. There are also a lot of them. Sure, you can setup the choke from guard or half-guard, but they aren't as solid as the mount or side control/knee-on-belly.

2. There are a lot of finishes, but most people make the mistake of trying to doa bunch of funky figure-four shit with their arms. The classic gable grip finish is still the best in my opinion, and you don't even have to walk your legs away from their body to get it to work. Simply keep your choking elbow and your forehead flat on the mat, hips touching, and flex while breathing and counting to 12/15. The limitation to the arm triangle is that there's really just one secure finish, and that's with you on top off to the side. The bottom finish isn't nearly as secure, but there you may want to try some figure-four arm configurations.

3. The structure of the position is solid, but there is one good avenue of escape where you take your trapped arm and hook it with your free hand behind your close knee and rock forward. This can get me out of most arm triangles, unless I'm dealing with a specialist. You may create a more stable structure by doing a figure-four, but I find it makes the choke itself less effective and can turn into a crank, or at worst, give them more avenues for escape.

Anaconda
Incredibly powerful. Rafael Mendes has taught us that it's also very versatile, in finishes and setups.

1. If you asked me this a year ago I would've said there was one basic setup for the Anaconda, and that's the gator roll. The gator roll is good and effective, but there's a lot of movement involved, and a lot of time for things to go wrong. You can also set the choke up by baseball sliding into the choke, DDTing them overhead, front flipping into it out of half-gaud, finishing from closed guard, etc. Not as versatile as the Darce, but more than people think.

2. There are not a lot of finishes. The main finish is you on your side, with them o their back/side, with you hipping/walking in and squeezing. Sometimes, if that's not enough, you will see people hook a leg or step over to the mount. If your opponent really scrambles or if you can't get the overhead sweep Anaconda, you can finish from full guard, but it's more effective to switch your hands to a Guillotine.

3. It's very hard to escape the Anaconda. Honestly, all of the head-and-arm chokes are structurally strong, and that's why they're so common. I like a lot of the more unorthodox Anaconda setups because most people are taught to defend the choke during the gator roll, so if you don;t do the gator roll as a setup, many people are stuck.

Darce/Brabo

1. Too many setups to count. The position can be gotten from top-half, top-side control, armdrags, bottom-side control, sprawl control from front headlock, standing, etc. From many of these setups you can force them on their side to lock up the position or baseball slide into the choke. There are literally dozens of Darce/Brabo setups.

2. As for finishes, there are 3 main ones. None of the other head-and-arms have 3 distinct finishing positions. There is the main finish where you are on top-side or top-half, etc, and you stay on your knees or sprawl to finish. I have recently learned that this is the worst of the three. The good thing is that you can put weight onto their shoulder, which aids the choke. But watch Chris Weidman try to Darce Andre Galvao. The guy on bottom has room to reguard or lift you with a butterfly hook if he can hold on for a few seconds. The baseball slide Marce/Cooper/Glover finish off the back/side is the next best, because they can't get underneath you. They can still scramble though. The best finish is to get them on their side and step over, either posting a foot or dropping to the mount. Even a knee-on-belly can work. This gives you the tightest choke, and they cannot scramble, because their hips cannot move. Even if you do the Glover setup, you can kind of do a back-roll over your shoulder and land directly on top of them, mounted. The step-over finish is being done by Cobrinha, Ryan Hall, and Rafael Lovato Jr. to name a few. Ryan hall did it to me a hundred times last weekend. Tightest I've ever been choked.

3. The structure is very solid, like the Anaconda. Anything with a figure-four or Mata Leao grip is going to be almost impossible to break once it's cinched in.

I gotta say man, it's hard to rank these in terms of effectiveness. I'm biased to the Darce/Brabo, because it has the most setups and 3 distinct finishing positions that are all very powerful. Most arm triangles, Anacondas, Peruvians, Howdys, are gonna be finished from 1 or maybe 2 positions, and most of them have way less setups than the Darce.

There's a reason in no-gi why after the Triangle and the RNC, the Darce and the Guillotine are the most common chokes. The Anaconda never really caught on in sub grappling as much as it did in MMA, even now. Hopefully, Mendes will change all that. The arm triangle is classic too, and for me, it's great when passing the guard using methods that pin an opponent's hips and knees to one side or the other. It causes a shoulder to lift on either side, and you can get under for the arm triangle.

You gotta play with what you like man. I would say the Darce/Brabo is the most versatile, and then everything else follows, but you have to find what works for you. Some people (not many) hate the Brabo/Darce. Also, even someone says you're tweaking their neck with these chokes, that doesn't mean you aren't blocking off their arteries.
 
WTH is a howdy choke?

Also, none of them should be a neck crank if done right.
 
All techniques are 100% effective when used with perfect technique

Well shit man, thanks for that info. I guess we can shut the board down now fellas...

I know what you're getting at, and I'm not trying to be a dick, but really think about whether that's the best response for his question. It's like that Rickson quote, "Technique is perfect, people are the problem." It sounds cute, but it's not all true.

There's a reason why the Triangle is the most common submission in BJJ and sub grappling. If every technique were equally effective under stress, than it would be ALL up to each grappler what moves they used. This isn't the case. There's obviously something about a Triangle that makes it stronger than anything else. This isn;t a Triangle thread, so I won;t go there, but I hope you see my point.

To take your comment further, if all techniques were 100% effective, there would be no BJJ. If you mounted someone, your mount would be inescapable, but their escape would be unstoppable too, creating a paradox. That's an extreme example like I said, but your comment just isn't true in the real world. Maybe in theory....
 
Oli: I can see how the fig-4 arm triangle would be less clean then the hand-clasping variants, but why is the s-grip more efficient then the gable grip?
 
WTH is a howdy choke?

Also, none of them should be a neck crank if done right.

None should be a neck-crank, BUT they may put some pressure on the neck, especially if your opponent has a small neck.

When Ryan Hall Darce choked me and stepped over to finish from the mount, I would've gone to sleep for sure, but I tapped because it also felt like my head was gonna tear off my shoulders. It wasn't a crank, but the pressure on my neck was intense.

This is a "Howdy" choke. (I refuse to call it that)

 
Oli: I can see how the fig-4 arm triangle would be less clean then the hand-clasping variants, but why is the s-grip more efficient then the gable grip?

It's not more efficient. Drysdale prefers the S-grip with a lot of head-and-arm chokes but the grips are all personal preference.
 
This is just my opinion and my training talking, so I could be wrong, just in my personal experience!

But I find that the S-Grip (when coupled with the sprawl and walking around to perpendicular) is the most direct side-on pressure to the neck. There's no real turning or crushing pressure, which I find is usually the issue when it comes to people complaining about the choke or cranking. Gable with the knee-ride usually causes their chin to come to their chest which again leads to their head tilting and cranking. Gable when sprawling still works, but again it uses a bit more of your shoulder than S-grip and because the pressure isn't directly in line with your body, there is still slightly more of a cranking motion.

That was really poorly explained, but I hope that makes at least some sense?

Edit: Again, to clarify, effectiveness depends on the individual, I'm just referring to what I consider the percentage probability of the guy going 'that wasn't really a choke, kind of a crank'. You know that the guy's are going to do it. ^_^
 
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Drew: Alright, I see what you mean.

And I was just wondering why Oli (on his personal scale) ranked the different grips for the arm-triangle the way he did.

And yes, it makes sense. Thanks. Just wondering because I when I go for the arm-triangle I use the gable-grip/sprawl variation.
 
IMO:

1. D'arce
2. Anaconda
3. arm triangle

This is my list as well. I have the Conda over the arm triangle simply because I like to attack the turtle a lot.

I will never turn down a opportunity to spread the sheer awesomeness that is the Darce/Brabo from mount so here are some vids. Enjoy, and notice the quickness from the taps, inability to scramble:

skip to 1:10


Skip to 2:30


Skip to 5:25
 
Babalu seems to think the Anaconda is effective enough.
It's not that any choke is less efective than another, it's just that different practitioners are less effective at performing some chokes than others.

I agree to an extent, but it's impossible to argue that there are more versatile, creative, and effective ways to set up AND finish a Darce choke than there are ways to set-up an Anaconda. To set up the Anaconda you HAVE to have front headlock control. You can set up a Darce from more angles and positions because you don't have to have the head locked up first. All you need is to be able to shoot your arm through the armpit. There is also no other head-and-arm choke that offers 3-4 DISTINCTLY different finishing positions that are all very powerful.

Not everyone is Rafa Mendes with their Anaconda chokes, and while I'm sure a lot of people prefer the Anaconda, most prefer the Darce/Brabo.

You aren't wrong. But mechanics of positions do make a difference, and it isn't all just the practitioner. There's a reason why there are infinitely more Darces than there are Anacondas in tournaments, and it's not because more people love the Darce. It's because as a position it offers more entries and more finishes.

As I said, there's a reason why the RNC, Triangle, Darce, and Guillotine are the most common chokes in no-gi.

Even to use you example of Babalu, even he prefers the Darce/Brabo. He's said so himself after he subbed Soko with it.

But just to be clear, there's nothing wrong with the Anaconda and people like Mendes are pushing the boundaries of how it can be set up and finished. The Anaconda is one of my projects for 2010. I think it will become bigger in no-gi, but right now, it's much bigger in MMA than it is in grappling.
 
I like the figure four grip arm triangle, it's pretty high percentage for me personally. I've just started experimenting with the d'arce and am only able to get it on inexperienced guys. I used to like the Anaconda but now I don't like the gator roll finish because you risk giving up position. I really want to get good at the d'arce since Drew raves about it.
 
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