This article is part of our Craig Jones Invitational 2024 coverage. To get live results, play by play, and commentary, we’ll have a live updates article running all weekend.
Matheus Diniz has just shocked the BJJ world by becoming the latest former ADCC world champion to reject his initial invite to ADCC 2024 in favor of competing at the inaugural Craig Jones Invitational instead. Diniz was due to compete in the under 88kg division of ADCC 2024, where he was going be one of the top contenders in what would have been his third consecutive appearance at the event. He actually won the division on his very first attempt at ADCC 2019 but he couldn’t replicate that success the second time around, as he went out in the second round of ADCC 2022 to eventual champion Giancarlo Bodoni.
Despite having competed at under 88kg at ADCC and sometimes as high as 94kg when he enters gi tournaments, Diniz is actually dropping a little bit further down in weight for this. He will be competing in the under 80kg division at the Craig Jones Invitational and although the bracket is already looking incredibly tough, he will undoubtedly be one of the top contenders to take home the title. This will undoubtedly be a taxing weight-cut for Diniz but with a million dollars on the line, it’s definitely worth going through that hardship to get a better chance of winning.
Barbosa isn’t the only grappler dropping down in weight to make the under 80kg division, as fellow ADCC veteran Lucas ‘Hulk’ Barbosa also announced that he would be making the switch to CJI. The two men have been sharing the mats for practically their entire black belt careers, with 6 matches between them dating all the way back to 2015. Although fans will no doubt be excited to see the next stage in their rivalry, there’s also some interesting matches with new opponents like Nicky Ryan awaiting Diniz at CJI too.
Matheus Diniz announced that he was going to leave ADCC 2024 in order to compete at the inaugural Craig Jones Invitational in a recent post to his official Instagram account:
