Ono Is One Of A Kind Wrestler

In partnership with

Last week the Wrestling World Championships were held in Albania. More importantly there was a generational run we have to give more attention to. Today we’re talking about one of the best snap downs I’ve ever seen.

This past week was a bit of a drag in our usual areas of study. Polaris put on a pro grappling event with 0 finishes on the main card. The UFC threw an event in Canada that ended as the longest ever non PPV card.

Not much action to analyze.

Before this weekend’s events, we were treated to the 2024 Wrestling World Championships. There we got maybe the most impressive combat sports run of the year.

Masanosuke Ono won the 61 KG division with a total of 55 points scored against 2 from his opponents. This includes Ono taking out former Olympic and World Champions.

For those that don’t watch freestyle wrestling there are a few ways to win. You can either pin your opponent’s shoulders to the mat, score more points than them, or, if time runs out and the point totals are tied, the judges award a win to the athlete who’s moves had the highest value, and/or had the least warnings called against them.

There is one another way to win that is much more decisive.

If a wrestler scores 10 points more than their opponent during the match they automatically win. This is called a technical fall, or technical superiority. The logic is that if one wrestler gets 10 points more than their opponent, they’re so much better, that the other won’t be able to get back in the match so we should end it to hurry the show on.

This Japanese man, Ono, achieved four technical superiority calls at the World Championships. Only one opponent made it to the final bell. And the score of that match was 10-2!

Did I write man? Maybe I should have said young adult.

Ono just turned 20 in February. As a matter of fact, he won the Under 20 World Championships earlier this year. Let’s look at how this boy dominated the men in his division at the 2024 World Championships.

That snap down was so fast and strong it’s confusing. What’s more impressive to me is how he can snap and snatch either ankle. Depending on the position of his collar tie he’ll either snatch that same side ankle, or the opposite side one.

Let’s take a look at what I mean. Here he has an inside tie and grabs the same side leg.

And here he is snapping and going away from the over tie.

In this tournament Ono was getting everything off of his collar tie. If his tie is inside he goes towards that direction. If you get the inside tie Ono over ties and goes away from it.

When Ono’s opponents turned to escape he locked his hands and rolled them for back exposure points. If they tried to wrestle out of the single he immediately pulled it across his own body and shelved it. Let’s look at a frame by frame sequence to demonstrate what I mean.

1. Ono is inside

2. Ono snaps his opponent’s hands to the mat

3. Ono was inside with his left so he went to his left for the shot

4. Ono has the single. He is gripping at the knee to prevent his opponent from turning their leg. Ono’s other hand is at the ankle so he can pull the leg across his body.

5. Ono stands and his opponent is stuck awkwardly turning away on one leg.

When Ono’s opponents got offensive on him he either dug under hooks or launched them through the air.

I’m not going to pretend to be a wrestling historian. I’m not able to rank this in terms of all time greatness relative to other single event performances.

But anyone with a pulse should see that this person is different.

Ono is only 20 and 4 of his 5 matches at the world championships ended because he was beating his opponent too badly. When your most common means of winning is “technical superiority” over other world champions you’re as elite as they come.

One of the matches that everyone wanted to see at the Wrestling World Championships was David Taylor and Abdulrashid Sadulaev. Both are former World and Olympic Champions and they’ve both competed at different weights.

Taylor’s international success came at 86KG. Sadulaev has an Olympic Gold Medal at 86KG, but the majority of his senior level success has come at 97 KG. These two men met in the middle at 92 KG, a weight Sadulaev hadn’t competed at since 2018.

Throughout the whole tournament, let alone this one match, Sadulaev nearly impossible to score on.

Later in the tournament Sadulaev shot back from certain loss to score the match winning points on the Iranian, Kamran Ghasempour.

These two specific sequences might seem like arbitrary picks but they highlight a technique that is extremely underused in no gi grappling. The chest lock.

The chest lock sticks your opponent beneath you and forces them to carry your weight. With the chest lock you can dump your opponent off to a side to cook them, or simply spin to their back for the most high percentage submission in MMA and jiujitsu, the rear naked choke.

The chest lock isn’t particularly complicated but you rarely see it in jiujitsu or professional grappling. Why?

I think it’s because the chest lock simply is not part of the sport’s language. And I think that this points to a blind spot in the sport of grappling that could be solved easily.

All martial artists should look for high level events outside of their primary sport. Watching what other people aren’t is the easiest way to learn things they won’t and get an edge.

Bruce Lee developed many of his unique techniques and strategies by studying fencing and western boxing. Studying outside of your profession to improve upon it isn’t limited to martial arts either. Arnold Schwarzenegger trained ballet to learn how to pose on stage.

The things that make your style uniquely yours come from your own unique studies, wherever you do them.

This week the most innovative event in grappling, The PGF, is back. You can watch their regular season for free on Youtube here. If you want to read about some of the athletes to pay attention to, you can review them in last week’s premium section here.

Next week we’ll be taking a closer look at an MMA fighter who was ahead of their time. The sport still hasn’t caught up to him either. If you want to read about one of the most creative fighters in MMA history, come back next week.

This weekend we get to see ONE Championship’s grappling savant Reinier de Ridder in the UFC. If you want to learn what his ceiling is, and where he has a unique advantage in the UFC, check out the Premium Section below. Click here to upgrade and access it if you haven’t yet. Otherwise, I’ll see y’all next week.