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In 1914, the catch wrestler and judoka Mitsuyo Maeda moved to Brazil to promote judo to a new audience. In particular, Maeda would attract the attention of Carlos Gracie in 1917, who convinced Maeda to train him in judo. Around 12 years later, Carlos passed his knowledge down to his brothers George and Hélio, the latter of whom would develop his knowledge into a new martial art known as Brazilian jiu-jitsu, or BJJ for short. Over the 20th century, the Gracies and their students would assert BJJ’s dominance over every other form of martial arts, particularly in anything-goes vale tudo events. Most famously, Royce Gracie dominated the early incarnations of the Ultimate Fighting Championship in the 1990s, winning 3 out of the first 4 UFC tournaments decisively. The Gracies’ winning streak came to an end when catch wrestler Kazushi Sakuraba systematically destroyed the Gracies (most famously in this 2000 fight between Sakuraba and Royce in PRIDE), but the Gracie school of BJJ still curries a lot of favour in mixed martial arts circles to this day.

What if none of this actually happened though? Suppose Maeda didn’t stay in Brazil, or he didn’t go to Brazil in the first place, or he died before he could leave Japan, or Carlos Gracie died in a street fight, or he just wasn’t interested in training under Maeda, or anything like that. What would combat sports be like today if the Gracies hadn’t developed BJJ?

The most immediate butterfly imo is that catch wrestling would be a lot more prominent as a legitimate form of martial arts. Wthout BJJ’s competition, folks like Karl Gotch and Billy Robinson would have a much easier time promoting catch wrestling as a legitimate martial art that could easily compete with traditional martial arts. No doubt Gotch, Robinson etc. still be prominent professional wrestlers, but they’d likely be well respected and remembered as great martial artists ITTL.

On that note, this would probably have one hell of an impact on professional wrestling as well, especially in the US and UK. Kayfabe would still be enforced throughout the 20th century, particularly in cartoonish territories like Memphis, but if catch wrestling were to take BJJ’s place as a legitimate combat sport, professional wrestling would be seen as much more legitimate in spite of its predetermined nature. (Besides, even if kayfabe died early, there’d still be demand for professional wrestling as a hypermasculine soap opera.) Also, Big Daddy might not kill the business in Britain if there’s a vibrant catch wrestling scene. Maybe.

What other butterflies would emerge from a world without BJJ?
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