About

In this episode of Tapped In, David Figueroa-Martinez breaks down how to truly weigh and value Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu techniques. Rather than relying on rigid "high percentage" definitions or blindly following lineage trends, David offers a personal and analytical framework for white through purple belts to build an authentic game. He explores how physical attributes, availability across positions, risk/reward consequences, and multi-layered dilemmas should dictate what stays in your personal repertoire—and why throwing out techniques that don't fit your body or philosophy is a key part of long-term grappler evolution.

Key Takeaways

• The "Attribute Tax" Defines True High-Percentage: A technique's success rate is heavily tied to what it demands physically—such as leg length, speed, or flexibility. As grapplers mature or face physical limitations, shifting toward lower-attribute, gravity-assisted controls (like top-position pressure) creates more reliable success.
• Filter Moves by Risk/Reward and Availability: High-value techniques are either readily available across multiple positions (like the armbar or choke setups) or carry low consequences if they fail, allowing you to reset or transition without giving up dangerous territory.
• Build Systems Around Dilemmas: Effective attacking games aren't about single isolated submissions; they rely on compounding dilemmas (e.g., triangle to omoplata to wrist lock/kimura) that put defenders on their heels regardless of how they respond.

Chapters

• 00:00 – Introduction & Rethinking High Percentage
• 02:08 – Why I Teach Moves I Don't Personally Use
• 03:08 – Personal Philosophy: Top Pressure over Bottom Guard Submissions
• 05:07 – Positional Availability: Armbars vs. Niche Chokes
• 06:05 – The Attribute Tax: Flexibility, Age, and Physical Limits
• 08:33 – Evaluating Risk, Reward, and Getting Stacked
• 10:55 – Creating Dilemmas and Branching Submission Chains
• 13:54 – Breaking Free from Lineage Obsession & Gym Identity
• 16:47 – Evolving Your Game: Throwing Moves Out to Grow
• 18:18 – Closing Thoughts & Patreon Community

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David Figueroa-Martinez

Founder, DFM Coaching Bjj

Full Transcript

00:00 | Welcome to Tapped In. My name is David Figueroa-Martinez of DFM Coaching. Today, we're going to be discussing how to weigh techniques. I did an episode on this previously, but I've given it more thought, and I've had more time to kind of weigh certain things and really look at it from internal—me, and how I weigh things—and then how overall techniques can be weighted based on a whole myriad of issues or reasons. So I wanted to retackle the subject and maybe be a little bit more clear.

00:46 | In my opinion, not all techniques are weighed the same, and some techniques are going to have, quote-unquote, "higher percentages." I might teach you a technique and tell you, "Hey, this isn't my go-to. This isn't something that I get a whole ton of success with," but I might explain to you why. I might explain, "Hey, I'm teaching a sequence, and I'm giving you options of what is available," and you might take to this technique really well. You might have the limbs for it, or the personality type for it, or you might be approaching it from a certain specific mindset that's different than mine. It might just interest you more.

01:42 | So then you spend more time developing it and getting that trial-and-error out of the way, understanding, "Oh, this is the angle I'm supposed to take. This is how I'm supposed to really set this up really effectively." So, I will teach techniques that I don't necessarily employ, use, or get a whole lot of success out of. And I'll explain why. I'll tell them, "Hey, so this is here as an option. I tend to use this more as a diversion." For example, I have a couple of techniques that are submissions, and they're legitimate threats, but I don't get a whole lot of success from them. So I use it to divert you; maybe you switch your hand placement, maybe you lift your elbow a certain way that allows me to get something else that I really want.

02:40 | So "high-percentage moves"—that phrase can have a lot of context in it. It can have a lot of ideas. For example, what I consider high-percentage may not be what another black belt considers high-percentage. I, for example, do not submit a whole lot of people from guard. It doesn't mean that guard submissions are low-percentage, because a lot of us are getting people with submissions off the guard. But my personal philosophy is: I want to get from under you, so I'd rather sweep. Again, I'll use a submission to make you shift, or pull back, or widen your base, or narrow your base, or whatever it is that I need to happen. And then I use that to get to the top positions, and those are where my quote-unquote "higher percentage" moves are.

03:49 | That's where I put most of my research and development. That's where I spend most of my time really honing in my craft, honing in the details of submissions—that's my personal philosophy, though. So for me, higher-rate or higher-percentage moves, submissions specifically, are coming from top. They're not coming from the bottom at all. And that was a realization that I had not that long ago. I was looking at my game and reevaluating certain things that I was doing, trying to really understand the overall philosophy of what I did. I realized that I'm not submitting people with armbars from bottom. I have shorter legs, so it's a little harder. There are things I like to do, but it's a little harder.

04:51 | I used to be big on getting kimura traps from bottom half guard. I don't do that often anymore as a 45-year-old because I have a couple of sore shoulders or lingering issues with some of my shoulders that I don't like the angle, so I don't really use it as much. There are certain moments where I will initiate to get a response, or initiate to bump, but I don't submit people from that spot. And then I started looking at, "Well, am I submitting people from at least the bottom of closed guard?" That's not happening all that often, to be honest with you.

05:39 | But again, those submissions are threats enough that they elicit a response that then I can get to the things that I really want, which is top side. So how we rate what we call high-percentage moves or submissions is really inherent on you, for the most part. It's inherent on your philosophy, your approach. I know people who have long legs, and they're very dexterous, and they set up beautiful triangles from bottom. Not really my thing. Even the submissions that I do set with my legs, like an omoplata, a vast majority of the time, this is to get you to sweep. Get you to roll, and then I come up, and then I use something else.

06:37 | And then on top of that, we can also look at: does a submission or a technique present itself in various locations? For example, if we look at a buggy choke, that's not readily available everywhere. So it's not something that most people are going to really chase and spend a whole lot of time on, because the presentation or the chance of that choke is so much lower than if you did an armbar. Armbars are readily available from various positions: top, bottom, side. You can inch your way and etch your way into an armbar of some kind. So that's also a good way of deciding whether this submission is high percentage or not—not that when I hook it in or cinch it in that I don't or do get submissions, but is it readily available from multiple positions? That's a great way to indicate whether this is high-percentage or not for you, or in general for Jiu-Jitsu.

08:00 | The other aspect that I tend to weigh more, especially now that I'm getting older, is the attribute tax. What does the move require? Does it require me to be faster? Does it require me to be stronger, more flexible? There's a lot of people in Jiu-Jitsu that are not very flexible. So you don't necessarily see gogoplatas very often; it requires a high level of flexibility. So some will say it's low percentage. Once you hook it in, probably great! But setting it up and getting there, for most grapplers, it's not a high-percentage submission attempt. But armbars and triangles are a little higher. Kimuras are a little higher. Rear naked chokes are much higher. Chokes in general! Like if you like a north-south choke, you have the ninja choke when it switches over, you can switch over to the back and start choking with the rear naked choke. So you have a lot of options there that don't require necessarily a ton of flexibility. You don't necessarily have to be super fast. If your controls are good, if you know how to fight off the hands, if you know how to situate legitimate control over someone, it lowers the attribute tax.

09:42 | "How athletic do I have to be?" And again, as I'm getting older and I'm getting a little slower, I'm not as strong, I'm not as athletic, I'm looking at all of these techniques from a slightly different lens than I did when I was 35—just a ten-year difference. So when you're looking at these submissions, how much do I have to have physically in order to do this? A good portion of these techniques can really be done with superior controls and setups: arm-head controls, using your legs (again, that's a dexterity and flexibility attribute). So there are quite a bit of techniques that are going to require more of your body, and then there's others that are going to be a little bit more simple where, if you have great technique, you're going to be able to cinch it in and get the submission.

10:56 | Again, if I'm on bottom, in my opinion, bottom techniques require a little bit more of an attribute tax. You have to be able to swing your legs a certain way. You have to be able to get onto your upper back and almost your neck sometimes. You have to be able to swing your hips one way or the other. So in my opinion, bottom techniques do require more mobility of your body so it doesn't get crushed and gets to the angles it needs in order to get to the submission. That's attributes. So I personally, specifically as I get older, I would rather use gravity. It's not an attribute. It's not something that only some people can utilize. Some will say, "Well, if you're bigger, you can use that more." Yes, but I've got students who are 140 pounds and they apply great pressure. It's not an attribute; it's a skill set. And then gravity itself aids in that skill set.

12:12 | So again, we can look at these techniques and decide what kind of attacks do I want to associate this technique with. If it's me on top, I can create angles to isolate your arms without having to be super strong. Is there some strength involved? Yes. But I can create some of the angles with my body aided with gravity. So decide how you want to build out your game and the attacking sequences and the things that you feel work really well for you. A lot of it's going to be interest, but you're going to have to associate those techniques in your interest level with what kind of attribute tax is going to be associated with that. That might change as you get older. You might be very flexible; you might be one of those people who loves berimbolos at 25. And then you get to 35, 40, and you're like, "Ah, I don't feel like doing these anymore." This is a tax that I don't want to incur because of the positional layout of what I'm having to put myself into in order to gain some kind of success in the technique.

13:48 | While we're on that note, a good category to also filter some of this stuff is consequence or risk/reward. Like if I go for a submission underneath and I get stacked really hard—I got some people who like to stack—that's a risk/reward that I don't want to face. I don't want to be stacked. And so that's one of the reasons why I don't do a ton of submissions from bottom, specifically armbars. I don't like being stacked. I don't want to risk my neck; I have a bad lower back. So I have to adjust on what is a worthwhile risk.

14:48 | If I'm on top and I go for a mounted armbar and they start to come up, I've learned that, hey, I've got to bail on this armbar. The risk/reward is way too high for me. So I bail and I try to take the back. But that's a sequence based on my own personality, my physical attributes, and my physical limitations that I'm making a conscious effort of. Not everyone's going to make that effort. Some people are going to say this is still a high reward, and I'm going to continue the armbar from the stacked position. Perfectly fine! But you have to decide whether that's a consequence you want to face or not.

15:43 | If I'm on bottom, for example, I will try the triangle, but I have zero confidence that it's actually going to take off. Very little to none—I have short legs, I'm 5'4" (5'3" probably). Anyways, so I'm not really doing it to hit a triangle; I'm doing it so that you move a certain way and I can hit the omoplata. That's a dilemma. You either give me the triangle—and if you're small enough, giving me the triangle will result in being triangled and/or armbarred—but when you pull away, I'm going omoplata and taking a sweep.

16:35 | And then another dilemma happens: I start initiating the omoplata, and you now have to decide what you want to do. Do you want to stay on your hands and knees and try to defend from there while I'm trying to sit up, or are you going to roll? If they roll, then I roll with them, and I end up in that weird position where I'm sitting on their shoulder, their arm is between my legs, and they're on their back. There's another dilemma that gets created there. I like to initiate a little bit of a wrist lock on the arm that's between my legs. And what happens there is: either I get the sub, or they bring their other hand in to defend. When they bring their other hand in to defend, I get a kimura grip.

17:35 | And then here's another dilemma: when I get that kimura grip, you're either going to go to your inside where now we're in north-south with your kimura-gripped arm on top, or you're going to try to flatten out. When you flatten out, then I go for the kimura that way. So there are dilemmas in everything that I'm doing when I'm chasing submissions. The more dilemmas, the better, because now I have you on your back foot the entire time. You're constantly defending, but I already know the roadmap. I know the route home, I know every detour, I know every cross street, every side street, all the unnamed alleyways—I know the entire route because I've initiated and played this game long enough that I understand it.

18:32 | So look at the submissions that you can do, and what else you can attach to them. You do a buggy choke—again, I'm not shitting on buggy chokes—but you do a buggy choke, where else are you going? How many different off-ramps do you have there? You do a triangle, you have triangle, armbar, omoplata, fist choke, a form of a collar choke, probably scissor choke if you're good enough, or teepee choke. So you have a lot of things that are within touching distance. So if they respond a certain way, you apply another submission. You don't just bail on the whole position. So any subs that have a lot of connecting submissions and off-ramps and on-ramps is a great set to kind of study. Study those; put time into those.

19:42 | And then the other thing that I'm just going to throw in here: don't be obsessed with the lineage or the thing that your gym is known for. Your instructor is going to have a game plan that's a base for him or her. They're going to have things that they love, and they're going to try to teach you guys what they love. I do the same thing. But one of the different things that I do is I want you guys to have games that you're proud of, that are unique to you. You built it, you put it together, you arranged the orchestra, you arranged the playlist, you arranged the setup. Your responsibility for your game is yours. I'm offering options, but my options don't all have to go into your game.

20:53 | Sometimes some instructors think that their game is perfect, and so they want to bestow that on other people so that their game is perfect. But we all have different temperaments, body types, leg lengths, arm lengths, ailments—all these things are going to contribute. You have different personalities; you might not like triangles at all, and your instructor is a triangle machine. What sense does that make? Additionally, sometimes an instructor might have an opinion on something. Like back in the day, I think Marcelo Garcia was not a fan of the kimura, and it was not part of his game. When you watch him, he's not really heavily invested in there; he loves some of the other techniques. And I remember hearing that, and at the time I was already invested in the kimura. I heard it, and I decided, "Okay," and I kept doing what I was doing.

22:04 | While a big man can get a lot of success with the kimura grip because they're so much stronger than other people, I don't believe it's a big man's technique. I believe that it's a technique that, if you know the angles and you know how to apply pressure the right way, you can make it work for you in a way that, unlike any other gripping sequence or submission, can. It is one of the most versatile positions and techniques in all of Jiu-Jitsu. In my opinion, it works for big or small people; you just have to apply it differently. So don't get caught up in what the big names in Jiu-Jitsu are doing or not doing. Find your own game, apply some of the things that I mentioned into how you're going to analyze that submission or that sweep or whatever it is that you're studying, and make decisions that are right for you—not because someone else has been doing Jiu-Jitsu for 30 or 40 years and they have an opinion that may not be beneficial to you. Their body type and their attributes are not going to be the same as yours.

23:25 | I think that's all I want to touch base on with this; it's already over 20 minutes. But use these to decide how you want to build out your game. If you have a game already kind of set up, it doesn't mean that you can't plug and play certain other things, especially if you're at blue or purple belt—you're going to throw out a lot of shit. Things that you spent a lot of time on, you might throw out because it doesn't quite work in harmony with everything else that you're building. Sometimes you're going to have to make that hard decision, and sometimes you throw something out that you pick up later because maybe you added some other things that complement that a little bit more. So don't be afraid to throw things out, don't be afraid to not add things that other people are having success with if it doesn't fit your game.