{"corpus":{"videos_analyzed":2044,"positions_published":1286,"connections_published":5317,"evidence_standard":"taught by at least 2 independent channels"},"chapters":[{"title":"Closed Guard","node_id":"closed-guard-bottom","thesis":"Closed guard is the one position in jiu jitsu where being flat on your back means you're winning. With your legs locked around their waist you control their posture and their distance — they can't retreat, they can't advance, and their submission threats are close to zero while yours stack up.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/closed-guard-bottom"},{"title":"Mount","node_id":"mount-top","thesis":"Mount is the position everyone's instincts and every rule set agree on: both legs past their hips, your chest over theirs, their submissions gone and yours all live. All things being equal, the person in mount is winning.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/mount-top"},{"title":"Knee on Belly","node_id":"knee-on-belly-top","thesis":"Knee on belly is a pin you take half standing: one shin across their belly nailing their hips to the mat, the other foot free on the floor. It holds less surface than side control but it pins the part that matters — hips that can't lift can't guard.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/knee-on-belly-top"},{"title":"Side Control","node_id":"side-control-top","thesis":"Side control is where guard passes cash out. The legs are beaten, your chest is on theirs, and for the first time in the exchange nothing of theirs is between you — which is exactly why every escape on the bottom player's list starts with putting something back in the way.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/side-control-top"},{"title":"North-South","node_id":"north-south","thesis":"North-south is the pass-finisher's answer to a defense that's working. When the bottom player keeps knee and elbow glued together, side control never truly happens — so instead of fighting the connection face-on, you go around it and pin from above the head.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/north-south"},{"title":"Back Control","node_id":"back-mount","thesis":"Back control sits at the top of the positional food chain for one blunt reason: the person underneath is fighting someone they can't see. Every strike of offense you have points at their neck, and almost nothing they have points back at you.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/back-mount"},{"title":"Crucifix","node_id":"crucifix","thesis":"The crucifix is back control's stranger sibling: you're behind them, but one of their arms is trapped between your legs. That splits their defense in half — one free hand has to answer an armbar and a strangle at the same time, and whichever it picks, the other attack opens.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/crucifix"},{"title":"Half Guard","node_id":"half-guard-bottom","thesis":"Half guard is one trapped leg and a whole fight over what happens above it. Coaches keep saying the same thing about the bottom: the main game runs through the underhook — win it and you have sweeps, back takes, and wrestle-ups; lose it and you're just holding a leg while they pass.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/half-guard-bottom"},{"title":"Knee Shield","node_id":"knee-shield","thesis":"The knee shield is half guard with a wall in it: your top knee slides across their body so your shin sits between your chest and theirs. Its whole job is denying the one thing every pressure passer needs — chest-to-chest connection.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/knee-shield"},{"title":"Deep Half Guard","node_id":"deep-half-guard","thesis":"Deep half guard is being underneath them on purpose: you come off your side facing them, swing your legs around their trapped leg, and park your whole body under their hips so their base is stacked on top of you. From down there their weight stops being pressure and starts being something you can steer.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/deep-half-guard"},{"title":"Turtle","node_id":"turtle-position","thesis":"Turtle is the position you pick when the alternatives are worse. Compared to being flattened under side control it keeps you off your back and mobile — which is exactly why it gets recommended to smaller players facing big opponents.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/turtle-position"},{"title":"Front Headlock","node_id":"front-headlock","thesis":"Front headlock is the position you inherit from good defense: they shoot, you sprawl, and your chest lands on the back of their neck. Most positions you have to earn — this one shows up on its own at every level change and every snapped-down head.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/front-headlock"},{"title":"De la Riva","node_id":"de-la-riva","thesis":"De la Riva is what you get when you wrap your foot around the outside of their lead leg and hook behind the knee. It looks like a small thing — one foot on one leg — but that hook plus a grip on the ankle owns the leg their base lives on.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/de-la-riva"},{"title":"Reverse De la Riva","node_id":"reverse-de-la-riva","thesis":"Reverse De la Riva mostly isn't a guard you choose — it's the guard that appears when they blade a knee into your open guard to knee cut. Your inside leg hooks around that entering thigh, and the pass they started becomes a position you own.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/reverse-de-la-riva"},{"title":"Open Guard","node_id":"open-guard","thesis":"Open guard is less a position than a situation: they're in front of you, your legs are between you and them, and nothing is locked. It starts the moment the closed guard opens — or the moment they stand up and you don't.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/open-guard"},{"title":"Butterfly Guard","node_id":"butterfly-guard","thesis":"Butterfly guard is a seated guard: you're up on your butt with your feet hooked inside their thighs, and the whole position is one long fight over connection. The ideal is four points of contact between you and them, and the bottom player's actual job — before any sweep — is to keep those points from being stripped.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/butterfly-guard"},{"title":"X Guard","node_id":"x-guard","thesis":"X guard is you underneath a standing opponent with both of your legs owning one of theirs — and the position's whole promise is that they never get to be comfortable standing again. The goal isn't holding them; it's staying under their hips and denying every attempt to settle their weight.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/x-guard"},{"title":"Single Leg X","node_id":"single-leg-x-guard","thesis":"Single leg X is where a huge amount of the modern game funnels: you're on your back with your legs wrapped around one of their standing legs, foot on the hip, hips curled underneath them. It's common enough that coaches now teach it as a position everyone will end up in, on both sides, whether they choose to or not.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/single-leg-x-guard"},{"title":"Standing","node_id":"standing","thesis":"Standing is the only truly neutral place in jiu jitsu — bottom is a disadvantage, top is an advantage, and on the feet nobody has anything yet. Every match starts here, and the whole question is who gets to decide how it hits the ground.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/standing"},{"title":"Spider Guard","node_id":"spider-guard","thesis":"Spider guard is arm control played with your feet: both sleeves gripped, both feet attached to the biceps, so their posture and their base are wired to your legs. Push one arm, curl the other, and they're steering themselves.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/spider-guard"},{"title":"Lasso Guard","node_id":"lasso-guard","thesis":"Lasso guard ties one of their arms to one of your legs: the leg threads over the arm and under the armpit, so their sleeve-side arm can't post, can't grip freely, and can't leave. Everything the guard does — sweeps, omoplatas, back takes — is a punishment for how they try to free that arm.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/lasso-guard"},{"title":"K Guard","node_id":"k-guard","thesis":"K guard is the leg locker's on-ramp: feet on the outside, knee wedged inside behind their knee, an underhook on their leg. From flat on your back it turns a kneeling or standing opponent into a menu of entries — to backside 50/50, to the back, to the legs.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/k-guard"},{"title":"Leg Entanglements","node_id":"leg-entanglement","thesis":"Leg entanglement is the umbrella name for the ashi garami family: positions where you wrap your legs around one of theirs and attach at two points. Before it's a submission, it's a pin played from underneath — you've taken one of their legs out of the game.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/leg-entanglement"},{"title":"50/50","node_id":"50-50-guard","thesis":"50/50 is the position with the most honest name in jiu jitsu: the same leg entanglement, mirrored. Whatever you can reach on them, they can reach on you, so nobody starts ahead — the position hands both players an identical set of locks and waits to see who uses them better.","url":"https://bjjprofessor.app/explorer/50-50-guard"}]}