Tye Ruotolo is wasting no time transitioning from grappling stardom in mixed martial arts, challenging for the ONE Championship lightweight title in his third professional fight Friday morning in Bangkok, Thailand.
It’s exactly the masterplan he had in mind coming into the sport.
Ruotolo made a name for himself with key title victories in the grappling circuit, from IBJJF Worlds and WNO to the ONE grappling belt, and decided to follow his brother Kade Ruotolo to the rings and cages under the ONE banner. Up 2-0 with a pair of rear-naked choke finishes in 2025, he now challenges two-division champion Christian Lee for the lightweight strap.
“Transitioning to MMA, it’s definitely been a big job,” Ruotolo told MMA Fighting. “It’s been learning a lot of things that I didn’t know. Kind of feel like a white belt again in some ways. It feels super weird, you know? But the whole process, it’s not something that I’ve been unhappy with. It’s something that I’ve loved. It’s definitely been easy for me to train, to be in the gym, to learn all the new aspects of MMA, from the hand-eye coordination to so different than jujitsu. It’s definitely been a big a big transition, for sure.”
Ruotolo’s first opponent in MMA was Adrian Lee, the younger brother of the man he’s about to face for a championship belt. Two months later, Ruotolo was already back in the cage to tap out 6-0 talent Shozo Isojima inside of a round. Watching jiu-jiteiros like Marcus Buchecha, Rodolfo Vieira, and Gilbert Burns make the transition from mats to cages gave him the inspiration to pursue the same in MMA. Now it’s his turn.
“That’s why I asked for a solid opponent, with Adrian Lee,” Ruotolo said. “I wanted to test my skills. I was watching my brother, I knew that we were good martial artists, that we weren’t just jiu-jitsu guys anymore. I was able to have a really good debut match. I always told Chatri [Sityodtong], I always told my brother that I don’t want to have a million MMA matches. I want to fight the best in the world. I don’t want to fight people I know I can win. I don’t want to fight the taxi cab drivers, you know? I want to fight the best in the world, so I’m looking forward to it.”
Ruotolo has faced MMA fighters in the grappling circuit before, defeating the likes of Reinier de Ridder, Marat Gafurov and Vagner Rocha, but Christian Lee brings a different level of experience under the ONE ruleset. Lee has only been submitted once in MMA, a 2016 loss to Martin Nguyen, and Ruotolo expects him to come out with a ferocious game plan for the early knockout.
“I think he’s going to try and get me out of there pretty quickly.” Ruotolo said. “It’s his goal. I think he wants to come in and throw big kicks and big punches and try to end the fight in the first round. I noticed he has a very high pace and he comes forward with a lot of aggression and a lot of [explosiveness] in the first round. I think he’s definitely going to try to get me out of there. I know as the fight goes on, he’s probably going to try to nail my legs a lot, make it hard for me to move and try to catch me with a big punch, maybe wait for my chin to raise a little bit. I think he’s going to try to just be aggressive, look for a big shot, or if he doesn’t get one in the first round, then try to kick my legs a lot. Just set up a big knockout shot.
“I know he probably doesn’t want to grapple with me, I’m assuming. We’ll see.”
Asked to rate Lee’s grappling skills on a scale from one to 10, Ruotolo eventually settled on a mid-range number.
“Let’s say if one is a… who’s got terrible grappling? I don’t know. I have a hard time… Who’s that heavyweight? [Robelis Despaigne]. Yeah, there we go,” Routolo said with a laugh. “One is Despaigne, and maybe 10 you can give, like, Gordon [Ryan] or Ruotolos or something. I probably rate [Lee] like a six, a five. It’s good.”
Ruotolo hasn’t fought in MMA in almost a year, but said fans shouldn’t expect any major differences in his style for Lee.
“A lot of forward pressure, just going for the kill,” Ruotolo said. “That’s my goal. I want to end the fight quick. It’s no secret, that’s what I come to do. I think it’s going to look pretty similar. Hopefully a little bit more efficient, a little bit better. … Realistically, the chances of me winning will be with the submission. I have a lot of cool tools that I’m looking to whip out in the fight as well, but that’s what I do best, so odds are that’s what’s going to happen.”
With a win Friday in Thailand, Ruotolo will be a champion in MMA at just 3-0, and plans on staying active in MMA and grappling to defend both titles. There are still goals to achieve and people to beat in grappling, the 23-year-old said, but feeling like a white belt again in a new discipline entices him more.
“I’m gonna sit with my brother and we’re gonna develop a game plan for the next six months and then I’m gonna fight my heart out,” Ruotolo said. “I was gonna say something I don’t think I can say yet [laughs]. We got the CJI next year too for the the jiu-jitsu side of things, and then I’m looking at defending my jiu-jitsu belt at ONE again in January, December. We’ll figure it out. Hopefully I can just get the 170 belt and then we’ll figure it out past that. It’s hard to look past Christian right now, but I want to be able to do as much as I can defend both belts, 100 percent.”
“I don’t want to stop here. It’s just starting,” he continued. “Like I said, I haven’t felt like a white belt in a long time. In jiu-jitsu, in the most humble way possible, I was almost getting a little bored with it, you know? Not bored, but less motivated. Still a couple competitions that really motivate me that I want to win, some people, but it wasn’t motivating me the way that it did my whole life, you know? And the MMA stuff right now, I’m so fired up. I see so many things I need to work on, and I see so many ways to improve, and that’s exciting for me.”
