Often a matter of perspective, there may be an argument about who is literally the best BJJ instructor. However, there is no doubt that the names on this list have earnt their place. When you are consistently able to produce outstanding competition teams that win at the highest level, there will come a time when people can no longer say you have just been blessed with a team of talented athletes.
Of course, instructors will have varying styles and excel in different areas to one another. With this being said, the results do not lie. Although the list will try to contain pure BJJ coaches, we understand that some of them have, and will continue to be in the corner of MMA fighters. It is difficult to distinguish between BJJ/MMA when coaching as there is often a big crossover between the two arts.
Table of Contents
John Danaher
This man needs no introduction. If you see a man in an NYC supermarket wearing a rashguard, it could well be him. He is the mastermind behind the Danaher Death Squad which includes and has included athletes such as Garry Tonon, Eddie Cummings, Gordon Ryan, Nick Rodriguez & Craig Jones. Between these athletes, they have won various, EBI, ADCC & too many superfights to count. If this wasn’t good enough on its own, he has also mentored lesser known non-athletes such as Brian Glick to become extremely solid black belts, who can now spar with the elite and not look out of place.
Perhaps what is most impressive about Danaher is that he was able to bring some of these athletes to the forefront of elite level BJJ competition in a relatively short space of time. Whilst most athletes are coming up during their late teens and early twenties.
Danaher’s Gordon Ryan was crushing the black belt scene within 1 year of receiving this accolade. It also should be noted that whilst Nick Rodriguez is an extremely strong and athletic wrestler, he had only been training BJJ for under 2 years when he got a silver ADCC medal. A feat that is unbelievable and will most likely never be repeated.
Danaher has a somewhat philosophical and flowery perspective on Jiu-Jitsu, often writing essay length pieces on his Instagram page about each position and common mistakes he observes. Arguably most respected online for his “Enter the System” instructionals, Danaher has become extremely influential in heel hooks, controlling the back and front headlocks. His monotone kiwi accent and methodical way of teaching have made him one of BJJ’s most recognizable coaches.
Fabio Gurgel
Fabio Gurgel is arguably the best BJJ coach of all time and has over 50 world champions who have come from his Alliance school. His competition team has included Marcelo Garcia, Tarsis Humphries, Reuban Charles “Cobrinha”, Lucas Lepri & Gabi Garcia. All of these names coming from the same professor is absolutely insane and perhaps there will never be one man with so many world champions underneath him.
An avid competitor in his own right, the coral belt is a 4 time black belt world champion and currently holds the record for the oldest winner of the European Championships at 40 years old.
At one point the Alliance team was controversial in BJJ with Gurgel allowing any competitor from any gym to come and train with him. He simply does not believe in the “creonte” label that we have seen thrown around in BJJ less often these days. Perhaps it was this revolutionary attitude and idea that propelled so many of his students to the top. By combining the best ideas and styles, his athletes were put into a pressure cooker where the weak would leave whilst the best would overcome, adapt, and rise to the top.
Andre Galvao
Galvao’s black belts include Keenan Cornelius, Josh Hinger, Hulk Barbosa, Ronaldo Junior, JT Torres & The Ruotolo brothers. It should be mentioned that a lot of Galvao’s Brazilian athletes were first taught by Fernando Terere, as was Galvao himself. It could well be Terere’s name on this list if he had not had so long away from the sport because of personal issues.
This is because Galvao himself is the greatest gi & no gi competitor of all time, his achievements are unmatched. With 5 world championship titles in the gi, along with 1 ADCC gold and 3 superfight winners, there is not really anyone else who comes close to winning in both disciplines.
Creating the biblical Atos team and still competing under it, Galvao is well known for his religious beliefs. Whilst he is still competing himself, Galvao still has a lot of young up and coming talent under his instruction. Due to the age of his students, they have not won a lot of world championships compared to older and more experienced teams.
However, this just looks like a matter of time. It is hard to imagine that by the time Galvao reaches his mid 40’s he will not have many world champions at the black belt level. There are a lot of athletes that have not been mentioned from Team Atos because they are brown belt or lower. Within the next 5-10 years, you will hear of them and know that it was Galvao that mentored them to the top.
The Mendes Brothers
Both Rafa & Gui Mendes were also elite competitors. They are both still very young compared to the likes of John Danaher so their AOJ team is not very old either. The Mendes brothers ripped apart the tournament scene revolutionizing the game with berimbolos, their dominance since leaving the competition side of BJJ is something which has not been seen since. The brothers have an unprecedented 10 world titles between them, along with 2 Gold medals at ADCC. It might not be long before their competition team catches up with them.
AOJ was once affiliated with Atos but has since split. The mendes brothers trained the Ruotolo Brothers until they became teenagers so have a very good kids team. The prospect Jessa Khan looks an excellent pick to become a future world champion very soon.
Lachlan Giles
BJJ is only just out of its infancy stages in Australia. Lachlan Giles and his protege Craig Jones are the first successful international competitors from the region. Before Craig Jones had his ADCC run submitting Leandro Lo & Murillo Santana he was pretty much unknown.
The man behind this success was Lachlan Giles who had nobody else to really learn from. Giles, whilst not the world’s best competitor, is still an elite level grappler and figured out heel hook mechanics pretty much by himself with the help of youtube.
Running his own gym named Absolute MMA out of Melbourne, Giles has some talented students of his own who are up and coming such as Jeremy Skinner & Izaak Mitchell. He is responsible for revitalizing the 50/50 position with his heel hook entries and also coming up with some Z-Guard inversions which also lead to a variety of heel hook entrances. Even his wife, Livia is a top competitor.
Marcelo Garcia
Similar to Galvao, Marcelo Garcia has had massive competition success being a 5 time world champion in the gi and winning ADCC 4 times. Known for being smaller than a lot of competitors in the absolute divisions, Marcelo is not as small as people think and weighs around 82kg. However, considering some of the opponents are well over 100kg, this is still a big discrepancy and is perhaps why his technique is so refined.
Best known for his seated guard style, Garcia developed and revolutionised the popularity of butterfly guard, which is now a very standard position for both BJJ & MMA.
Although competition teams are always changing Garcia is coaching and has coached in the past the likes of Dillon Danis, Bernado Faria, Gianni Grippo & Matheus Diniz. This is a very impressive roster considering Garcia only opened his own academy in 2009. Most of the other teachers on this list are either very new to coaching and don’t have many high level grapplers yet or have been running for a lot longer than Garcia.
Well known for his friendly attitude and calm temperament, Garcia is quite clearly capable of taking his students to the next level and beyond, proving that you do not just need toughness and ruthlessness to reach the top.
Firas Zahibi
Firas Zahibi is yet another of John Danaher’s extremely technical black belts. Best known for his stand-up wrestling abilities and being an MMA coach, Zahibi is able to formulate and get his fighter to execute a winning gameplan. Whilst he is not known for producing elite BJJ competitors, he is still responsible for the early development of athletes such as Ethan Crelinsten & Oliver Taza.
The Tri-Star gym is best known for Georges St Pierre who is arguably the best MMA fighter of all time. Zahibi is widely considered to be the man behind St Pierre’s success after coaching him for almost the entirety of his career.
Other fighters that have trained at Zahibi’s gym include Kenny Florian, Robert Whittaker, Joe Duffy & Kevin Lee. Whilst these athletes have not been as successful as some of the BJJ competitors mentioned. It should be noted that this is a completely different sport. It is extremely difficult to get to the top of BJJ, but perhaps even harder to do so in MMA, where a single mistake can mean a big career-changing knock out or injury.
Zahibi is without a doubt one of, if not the best all-round MMA coach in the world today, which is why so many fighters from across the globe travel to Canada to train there.
