The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places. -Ernest Hemingway

By Dan Tom

With a poetic intro appropriate for a poetic career, Jeff Monson will once again return to the Submission Underground stage to pay homage to his humble beginnings on Sunday, Jan. 29, at Roseland Theater in Portland, Oregon.

Even though the 46-year-old still has the skills to compete with anyone on the mat, the submission fighting veteran will have his work cut out for him at Submission Underground 3 against a new breed of grappler in 21-year-old Gordon Ryan. 

Watch Submission Underground 3 presented by Chael Sonnen and FloSports LIVE at 3 PM PST on Sunday, Jan. 29, on FloGrappling.com.

Birth Of 'The Snowman'

A former Oregon State and University of Illinois wrestler, Monson was a Pac-10 Conference champion in college before finding success in the USA Wrestling senior divisions. His craving for competition hit another level when he officially began his MMA career and came out to a fast 3-0 start in 1997 and 1998. Although Monson's submission defense would eventually falter in his first handful of MMA fights, he earned one of his biggest accolades to date and a nickname to go along with it in 1999.

It was at the ADCC Submission Wrestling World Championships in Abu Dhabi where "The Snowman" was born. Noted by competitors and spectators alike, Monson's style on the mat was compared to a snowball -- "white, compact, rolling and getting bigger and stronger as the tournament went on." After entering as a relative unknown, Monson defeated four Brazilians consecutively en route to winning the 88-89 kilogram weight class.

Despite having mixed success in ADCC over the next decade, Monson never seem to get too high nor too low as he took on all challenges across the globe. Quickly developing a name for himself, Monson would meet other future names in the grappling world as he faced a young Marc Laimon shortly after his ADCC trials.

Jeff Monson vs. Marc Laimon:

Move To The Octagon

As active as Monson was in the grappling world, he was equally as active in the MMA world. Not only did the Snowman travel a lot for competitions, but he also traveled a lot for training as one of the first notable fighters to train across multiple high-level camps. Toward the end of 2000, Monson found himself spending a lot of time in Olympia Washington with Team Quest to help prepare for his upcoming UFC 29 bout with Chuck Liddell.

Despite learning a brutal lesson involving leg kicks in a loss to Liddell, Monson would continue onward as he got another shot in the UFC just over a year later.


Chael Sonnen and Jeff Monson.

Even though Monson dropped his return fight with Ricco Rodriguez and a subsequent bout to Forrest Griffin in 2002, his hard work would begin to pay off and he began to turn things around.

Compiling a 16-fight winning streak in which he scored a slew of submission victories, Monson earned a title shot against Tim Sylvia at UFC 65 in November 2006.

Having a surprisingly strong third round, Monson was almost able to catch Sylvia with his patent north-south choke setup on multiple occasions. However, the champion trained for Monson well as Sylvia was able to escape and win back positions as well as rounds. Although that was the closest that Monson came to UFC gold, he still would go on to find success in other MMA shows.

An Ageless Style

Whether he was fighting Kazuyuki Fujita in Pride or Sergei Kharitonov in Dream, Monson was following his warrior's calling and going wherever there was competition. In fact, during this time, Monson was doing particularly well in the grappling scenes, scoring multiple titles with the IBJJF and FILA organizations through 2007-08.

Jeff Monson at the 2008 FILA Finals:

In Monson's final match to win the 2008 FILA Grappling World Championships (shown above), you get a solid glimpse of the catch wrestling influence in his game, especially when he utilizes a half-nelson variation into a neck crank that is reminiscent to Billy Robinson, a grappler before Monson's time.

Like many grappling greats, Monson's game is a simple one. Usually settling briefly on top before looking to pass to side control, Monson is an excellent positional player and a skillful stifler. Once achieving a dominant position, Monson will seek to set up a suffocating north-south choke. And should those attempts fail, Monson is more than happy to stay on top and cook his opponent into an uncomfortable point of vulnerability.



Although Monson does not look particularly speedy or agile, he is crafty with his technique and wields a deceptive grappling IQ. Similar to a prime Rodrigo Nogueira, Monson is not shy when it comes to dropping down to guard or diving for a deep half-guard.

Though being on the bottom is considered to be a bad position generally, Monson uses these opportunities to compensate for poor shots and the disadvantageous position to often trick opponents into grappling with him. Once accomplished, Monson immediately works for butterfly reversals or single-leg getups to regain momentum.

On Sunday, Monson will once again put these techniques to the test at SUG 3 against Ryan, who has been able to storm the submission scene as a blanket of non-decimating offense.

Considering Monson was grappling at a high-level before Ryan was even born, this will be an interesting test of the new age versus the old guard. And although the Hemmingway quote above warns that the world will eventually break us all, Monson will look to show that he is still strong in the scene that he help create.

How to Watch Submission Underground 3 (SUG 3) 

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