Elite grappler Nicky Ryan recently shared with the world that he has invented a new submission, one that his teammate Ethan Crelinsten dubbed ‘The Nickotine’. The name has come about for very obvious reasons, and many submissions have been named after the person who either invented or at least popularized them. It isn’t entirely surprising that Ryan has managed to create something new either, he’s very well-respected among competitors as one of the sharpest minds in the sport. Although injuries have hampered his career over the last few years, he’s still incredibly technical and serves as one of the coaches at B-Team Jiu-Jitsu.
Some people might argue that nothing in grappling is ever truly invented in the modern era, as it has likely all been done by someone else in the years prior. Head and arm chokes in particular have an incredibly long history and they all work on the same principle that dates back to the emergence of the arm triangle choke over a century ago. Regardless of whether anyone is able to find footage of another competitor pulling off the same submission in the past, it’s clear that Ryan discovered this independently and it’s not something that many people will have ever seen before.
The Nickotine is a fairly straightforward submission to understand for someone already experienced in the sport, and Nicky Ryan describes it as a ‘reverse seated katagatame’. That’s an accurate quick description, but he also goes on to demonstrate it in more detail and includes his most common entry in to the submission. It involves taking control of the opponent’s head and arm with your arms locked in an S-grip, shelfing their head on your hip. From there you sit back and swing your leg over them in order to control the body and apply the finish. There’s also useful footage of Ryan and JB Bechtloff hitting it in live training, and it’ll be interesting to see if any B-Team competitors start winning matches with it.
The footage of Nicky Ryan demonstrating the new submission that he invented, The Nickotine, was uploaded to the official YouTube channel of B-Team Jiu-Jitsu:
