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Craig Jones

Australian black belt who lost two ADCC finals, then built a rival tournament that paid every entrant a dollar more than ADCC paid its winners.

Biography

Craig Jones is an Australian black belt who reached the final of the ADCC World Championship twice and lost both times. ADCC is submission grappling's best-known title, contested every two years, and its matches are decided either on points or by submission — a strangle or a joint lock that forces an opponent to concede. In August 2024, two years after the second of those defeats, Jones staged a tournament of his own in the same city and on the same weekend as ADCC, and paid every athlete who accepted an invitation one dollar more than ADCC paid the winner of a men's division. He was born in Adelaide, South Australia, in 1991. Australian rules football and basketball filled his childhood, with short spells in taekwondo and judo, and as a teenager he turned toward mixed martial arts; by his fifteenth birthday, in BJJ Heroes' account of it, the ambition was to fight in the UFC. Jiu-jitsu came in 2006, at a gym called ISOHEALTH run by his cousin Matt Jones, and it was under his cousin that he first made his name on the Australian national circuit. As a purple belt he joined the Maromba Academy in Melbourne, later renamed Absolute MMA, where Lachlan Giles took over his instruction. Giles is the teacher his own lineage runs through. Competing at purple, Jones won the AFBJJ Pan Pacific Championship in 2014 in both his weight class and the absolute — the open division, where size is set aside and everyone enters one bracket — and took the ADCC Asian and Oceania trials the same year. In 2015 he won the purple belt division at the IBJJF World No-Gi Championships, which Wikipedia records as the first IBJJF world title won by an Australian man; no-gi means grappling without the heavy jacket the sport is usually trained in, and without the grips that jacket offers. He was promoted to brown belt that December. Giles gave him his black belt a year after that, in 2016, the same year he won the Asian and Oceania trials for the second time. He began teaching regularly around then, and finished a degree in behavioural science while he was still competing. He also spent long stretches training with John Danaher at Renzo Gracie's academy in New York, where BJJ Heroes counts him among Danaher's best-known competitive students. His first ADCC was in 2015, and it was brief: Romulo Barral submitted him in the opening round. His second, in 2017, ended without a medal, and not for any lack of results along the way. In the -88kg bracket he strangled Leandro Lo with a rear-naked choke, applied from behind the opponent, in an elimination round, then caught Murilo Santana with a flying triangle in the quarter-final. In the absolute division that same weekend he finished Chael Sonnen with an outside heel hook — a leg lock that twists the knee — before Gordon Ryan stopped him in the quarter-final. The -88kg run closed the same way: Keenan Cornelius beat him 13-0 in the semi-final, Alexandre Ribeiro took the bronze match 2-0, and Jones finished fourth in a division Ryan won. Those placings are read from ADCC's own published results; the connected account of his upbringing, his belts and his fight record rests in large part on a single reference database, BJJ Heroes. He is a submission fighter in the plainest sense of the phrase. Of the 64 wins on his BJJ Heroes record at the time it was read, 52 came by submission and two on points, against 19 losses. The same page breaks those 52 down, and two holds share the top of the list at 14 apiece: the inside heel hook and the rear-naked choke. His listed division is 88.30kg and his listed favourite position the open guard, the bottom position played with the legs free rather than locked around the opponent. Away from ADCC he won the Polaris 205 lb title in 2018 and the 185 lb title in 2018 and 2019. Then came the two finals. At ADCC 2019 he took silver at -88kg, losing the final on points to Matheus Diniz, with Josh Hinger third and Jon Blank fourth. Three years later he moved up a weight class and arrived in the same place: at -99kg in 2022 he beat Nicholas Meregali in the semi-final and lost the final on points to Kaynan Duarte. Meregali took third that year and Rafael Lovato fourth. That championship was held on 17 September 2022 at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas. The New York years ended in Puerto Rico, where Danaher's team relocated during the pandemic so it could keep working. On 26 July 2021 John Danaher announced that the Danaher Death Squad would no longer exist as one training and competition team. The reasons he set out publicly were the location chosen for a future school, conflicts between personalities, differences in values, and the strain between the team's own name and the individual names its members were building. Jones went to Austin, Texas, and later that year announced a new team, B-Team, founded with Nicky Ryan, Ethan Crelinsten and Nick Rodriguez. That December he submitted Donald Cerrone, a UFC veteran, with a rear-naked choke at the 2021 Combat Jiu-Jitsu Featherweight World Championships. In 2024 he said he had raised three million dollars to put on a tournament of his own. The Craig Jones Invitational ran on 16 and 17 August that year at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas — the same building where he had lost the ADCC final two years earlier — and streamed free on YouTube. ADCC 2024 ran on 17 and 18 August in the same city, and the overlap was chosen rather than stumbled into. By his own account Jones set the event up because he was dissatisfied with what ADCC paid its athletes, and the payouts carried that argument: a minimum of $10,001 to every invited competitor — one dollar above the $10,000 ADCC paid the winner of a men's division — one million dollars to each division winner, and a $50,000 bonus for the best submission of the weekend. Kade Ruotolo won under 80kg and Nick Rodriguez won over 80kg. Jones took an intergender superfight against Gabi Garcia and beat her. The event raised $500,000 for the charity Tap Cancer Out, held more than 100,000 concurrent viewers on the free stream on both days, and took two prizes at the 2024 Jits Magazine BJJ Awards: Promotion of the Year, and Fight Card of the Year. A second edition followed on 30 and 31 August 2025 at the same venue, run as a team competition. That one did not settle cleanly: the team final was scored a draw, then decided in B-Team's favour, and in the dispute that followed both teams were to be paid a million dollars — money Team New Wave ultimately did not receive. Jones himself met Chael Sonnen again, eight years after taking him with an outside heel hook in the 2017 absolute, and submitted him twice in one evening, both times with a buggy choke: thirty seconds in the first bout, and a minute and a quarter in the immediate rematch. He had said beforehand that the fight would be his last and that he was retiring. Whether he also left B-Team is not settled: Wikipedia's entry on him has him departing the team in 2025 after that event, and describes B-Team elsewhere as the place where he still trains. The teaching has run alongside the competing. He was the jiu-jitsu trainer behind two UFC title fights, Alexander Volkanovski against Islam Makhachev and Jack Della Maddalena against Belal Muhammad, and on The Ultimate Fighter he was the jiu-jitsu coach for Volkanovski's team. He promoted Nick Rodriguez to black belt in December 2023, although Rodriguez's own record names Jay Regalbuto and John Danaher as his coaches and describes Jones as his teammate and the co-founder of their team. Jozef Chen, who never joined B-Team full time and trained there in stretches before big competitions, took his brown belt from Jones in 2023 and his black belt from him on 6 March 2025, at the team's headquarters in Austin.

Sources for this profile

  • BJJ Heroes, "Craig Jones", fighter database entry (undated).(opens in a new tab)

    • Craig Benjamin Jones was born on 17 July 1991 in Adelaide, South Australia.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", first line; and the data block row "Full Name: Craig Benjamin Jones"

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    • As a boy Jones played Australian rules football and basketball and trained briefly in taekwondo and judo. As a teenager he turned to mixed martial arts, and by his fifteenth birthday he wanted to fight in the UFC.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", second paragraph

      Accessed:

    • Jones started jiu-jitsu in 2006 at his cousin Matt Jones’ academy, a gym called ISOHEALTH, and made his first name for himself on the Australian national grappling circuit under his cousin’s guidance.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", third paragraph, first sentences

      Accessed:

    • As a purple belt Jones joined the Maromba Academy in Melbourne, later renamed Absolute MMA, where Lachlan Giles took over his instruction.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", third paragraph, final sentence

      Accessed:

    • Jones earned his brown belt in December 2015 after the IBJJF World No-Gi Championships, became a regular instructor around the same time, and was promoted to black belt by Lachlan Giles a year later. He also worked extensively with John Danaher at Renzo Gracie in New York City, where he became one of Danaher’s best known competitive students.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", fourth paragraph

      Accessed:

    • Jones won the IBJJF World No-Gi Championship in 2015 in the purple belt division, took the AFBJJ Pan Pacific Championship in 2014 at purple in both weight and absolute, won the ADCC Asian and Oceania Trials in 2014 and 2016, and graduated with a degree in Behavioural Science (Psychology) while competing.

      Where in the source: Data block, section "Main Achievements (Colored Belts)" with the footnote key "** Weight and absolute"; and the biography’s fifth paragraph for the degree

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    • BJJ Heroes lists Jones as Polaris 205 lbs champion in 2018 and Polaris 185 lbs champion in 2018 and 2019, and gives his favourite position as the open guard and his division as 88.30 kg.

      Where in the source: Data block, sections "Main Achievements" and the rows "Favorite Position/Technique" and "Weight Division"

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    • On the way to that fourth place Jones beat Leandro Lo by rear-naked choke in an elimination round and Murilo Santana by flying triangle in the quarter-final, then lost the semi-final to Keenan Cornelius 13-0 and the third-place match to Alexandre Ribeiro 2-0. In the same championship’s absolute division he beat Chael Sonnen by outside heel hook in an elimination round before losing to Gordon Ryan by katagatame in the quarter-final.

      Where in the source: Table "CRAIG JONES FIGHT HISTORY", the 2017 ADCC rows read together across both the 88KG and ABS entries, with the stage column (E1, 4F, SF, 3RD) intact

      Accessed:

    • Conflicting accounts

      Jones lost the 2019 ADCC -88kg final to Matheus Diniz 2-0 on points and the 2022 ADCC -99kg final to Kaynan Duarte 12-0 on points.

      Where in the source: Table "CRAIG JONES FIGHT HISTORY", rows "Matheus Diniz / L / Pts: 2x0 / ADCC / 88KG / F / 2019" and "Kaynan Duarte / L / Pts: 12x0 / ADCC / 99KG / F / 2022"

      Accessed:

    • BJJ Heroes puts Jones’ grappling record at 64 wins and 19 losses, with 52 of the wins by submission and only two on points.

      Where in the source: Section "CRAIG JONES GRAPPLING RECORD"

      Accessed:

    • In July 2021 John Danaher announced the end of the Danaher Death Squad as a unified training and competition team. BJJ Heroes quotes his stated reasons as the physical location of a future school, personality conflicts, conflicting values, and tension between the team brand and the growing individual brands of its members. Later that year Jones announced a new team, the B-Team, formed with former training partners Nicky Ryan, Ethan Crelinsten and Nicky Rodriguez, based in Austin, Texas.

      Where in the source: Section "DANAHER DEATH SQUAD BREAK-UP", both paragraphs

      Accessed:

    • Craig Jones is Australian, born in Adelaide, South Australia.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", first line

      Accessed:

    • Craig Jones was born in 1991.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", first line, year component of "July 17, 1991"

      Accessed:

    • Craig Jones holds a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, awarded by Lachlan Giles.

      Where in the source: Section "Craig Jones Biography", fourth paragraph, "Lachlan Giles promoted Craig to black belt"

      Accessed:

    • BJJ Heroes gives Jones’ team affiliation as Absolute MMA and B-Team.

      Where in the source: Data block, row "Team/Association: Absolute MMA / B-Team"

      Accessed:

    • Of the 52 submission wins on Jones’ BJJ Heroes record, the breakdown given is 14 inside heel hooks, 14 rear-naked chokes, five outside heel hooks, three kneebars, three triangles, two terra footlocks, two toe holds and one heel hook, with the remainder single instances of other holds.

      Where in the source: Section "52 SUBMISSIONS WINS", the breakdown list

      Accessed:

  • ADCC, official results page for the 2017 ADCC Submission Fighting World Championship.(opens in a new tab)

    • At the 2017 ADCC World Championship the -88kg podium was Gordon Ryan first, Keenan Cornelius second, Alexandre Ribeiro third and Craig Jones fourth.

      Where in the source: Division block "-88kg" in the results table, all four places read together

      Accessed:

  • ADCC, official results page for the 2019 ADCC Submission Fighting World Championship.(opens in a new tab)

    • At the 2019 ADCC World Championship the male -88kg placings were Matheus Diniz first, Craig Jones second, Josh Hinger third and Jon Blank fourth.

      Where in the source: Division block "MALE -88KG" in the results list, all four names read in order

      Accessed:

  • ADCC, official results page for the 2022 ADCC Submission Fighting World Championship.(opens in a new tab)

    • At the 2022 ADCC World Championship the male -99kg placings were Kaynan Duarte first, Craig Jones second, Nicholas Meregali third and Rafael Lovato fourth.

      Where in the source: Division block "MALE -99KG" in the results list, all four names read in order

      Accessed:

    • The 2022 ADCC World Championship, at which Jones took second in the -99kg division, was held at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas on 17 September 2022.

      Where in the source: Event header above the results table: date block "SEP 17 2022" and venue line "Thomas & Mack Center, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States"

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  • Wikipedia, "Craig Jones Invitational" (English), read 2026-09-20.(opens in a new tab)

    • The Craig Jones Invitational is a submission grappling tournament organised by Craig Jones. The first edition was held on 16-17 August 2024 at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas and streamed free on YouTube. Jones, a two-time ADCC silver medallist, set it up because he was disappointed with athlete pay at ADCC: every invited athlete received a minimum of $10,001, one dollar more than the $10,000 ADCC paid its male division winners, and each division winner took $1 million. A best submission bonus of $50,000 was announced. The dates and city were chosen to overlap with ADCC 2024, held 17-18 August in the same city.

      Where in the source: Lead section and section "2024 / Background", including the payout figures and the sentence on the overlapping dates

      Accessed:

    • At the 2024 Craig Jones Invitational, Nick Rodriguez won the over-80kg division and Kade Ruotolo the under-80kg division, and Jones beat Gabi Garcia in an intergender superfight. The event raised $500,000 for the charity Tap Cancer Out, drew over 100,000 concurrent viewers on the free stream on both days, and won Promotion of the Year and Fight Card of the Year at the 2024 Jits Magazine BJJ Awards. A second edition on 30-31 August 2025 at the same venue used a team format, was won by the B-Team, and included a superfight in which Jones beat Chael Sonnen.

      Where in the source: Lead section, section "2024 / Results" and "2024 / Reception", and section "2025"

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  • BJJ Heroes, "Jozef Chen", fighter database entry (undated).(opens in a new tab)

    • BJJ Heroes gives Jozef Chen’s lineage as running through Lachlan Giles to Craig Jones to Chen, and records Chen as Flo Awards Breakthrough Athlete of the Year in 2023 and winner of the 2023 ADCC European Trials.

      Where in the source: Data block, row "Lineage: Carlos Gracie > Helio Gracie > Carlos Gracie Jr > Jean Jacques Machado / Rigan Machado > John Will > John Simon > Lachlan Giles > Craig Jones > Jozef Chen"; and "Main Achievements (Pro Level)"

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    • Jozef Chen received his brown belt from Craig Jones in 2023 and his black belt from Jones on 6 March 2025 at the B-Team headquarters in Austin. The same page notes Chen never became a full-time B-Team member, training there in stretches before major competitions.

      Where in the source: Biography section, paragraph beginning "Although he did not become a full-time member of the B-Team", and the sentence dating the black belt

      Accessed:

  • BJJ Heroes, "Nick Rodriguez", fighter database entry (undated).(opens in a new tab)

    • BJJ Heroes gives Nick Rodriguez’ lineage as running through Lachlan Giles to Craig Jones to Rodriguez, and lists him as winner of the Craig Jones Invitational in 2024, winner of the 2019 ADCC US West Coast Trials and ADCC World Championship silver medallist in 2019 and 2022.

      Where in the source: Data block, row "Lineage: ... Lachlan Giles > Craig Jones > Nick Rodriguez"; and "Main Achievements"

      Accessed:

    • Nick Rodriguez was promoted to black belt in December 2023 by Craig Jones, whom the page describes as "his teammate and co-founder of B-Team". The same page records that Rodriguez trained full-time under John Danaher in New York and later in Puerto Rico when that team relocated, that his purple belt came from coach Jay Regalbuto, and that he helped form the B-Team after the split in 2021.

      Where in the source: Biography section, paragraph beginning "After his ADCC experience", and the sentence dating the black belt promotion

      Accessed:

  • Wikipedia, "Craig Jones (grappler)" (English), read 2026-09-20.(opens in a new tab)

    • Conflicting accounts

      Wikipedia’s article on Craig Jones states in its opening that he "was the head of B Team Jiu-Jitsu, departing in 2025 after the CJI2 event", and records in its 2025 section that he announced his CJI 2 superfight would be his final match and that he was retiring from the sport.

      Where in the source: Lead section, first paragraph; and section "2025", sentence beginning "He later announced that this would be his final match"

      Accessed:

    • Jones was the Brazilian jiu-jitsu trainer of the UFC fighters Alexander Volkanovski and Jack Della Maddalena for their championship fights against Islam Makhachev and Belal Muhammad, and served as the jiu-jitsu coach for Team Volkanovski on The Ultimate Fighter.

      Where in the source: Section "Instructor career"; and the Biography section, sentence naming Team Volkanovski

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    • At the 2015 ADCC World Championship Jones lost in the first round by submission to Romulo Barral. The same year he won the IBJJF World No-Gi Championship in the purple belt division, which the article states made him the first Australian male to win an IBJJF world championship.

      Where in the source: Section "Grappling career", paragraph covering 2015

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    • During the COVID-19 pandemic Jones moved with the rest of the Danaher team to Puerto Rico to continue training, and he had earlier moved to New York to train under John Danaher alongside Gordon Ryan. The article dates the break-up of the team training under Danaher to 26 July 2021, after which Jones relocated to Austin, Texas to create the B-Team.

      Where in the source: Biography section, paragraphs on the move to New York, the Puerto Rico relocation and the break-up

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    • Jones submitted the UFC veteran Donald Cerrone with a rear-naked choke at the Combat Jiu-Jitsu Featherweight World Championships on 19 December 2021. At the Craig Jones Invitational 2 he submitted Chael Sonnen twice in the same evening, both times with a buggy choke, the first in 30 seconds and the second in 1 minute 15 seconds after an immediate rematch.

      Where in the source: Section "Grappling career", 2021 paragraph; and section "2025", paragraphs on the Sonnen bouts

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    • Jones announced in 2024 that he had secured a total of $3,000,000 in funding to host his own tournament.

      Where in the source: Section "The Craig Jones Invitational", first sentence

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    • Conflicting accounts

      Wikipedia states that Jones lost the 2022 ADCC -99kg final to Kaynan Duarte on points, 4-0, after defeating Nicholas Meregali in the semi-final.

      Where in the source: Section "Grappling career", 2022 paragraph

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Competition results

Recorded tournament results, newest first
YearEventResultDivision
2022ADCC 2022Source: adcombat.com-99 kgNo-giVerified2nd place-99 kgNo-giVerified
2019ADCC 2019Source: adcombat.com-88 kgNo-giVerified2nd place-88 kgNo-giVerified
2017ADCC 2017Source: adcombat.com-88 kgNo-giVerified4th place-88 kgNo-giVerified

Lineage

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Trained under

Students2