CJI 3 in 2026: The Cancellation, the Revival, and Where Pro Grappling's Money Is Moving

Update (August 7, 2026): Cancelled, Then Revived — the CJI 3 Saga So Far

This analysis was published on May 23, 2026. Four days later its central subject blew up, so here is the current state of CJI 3, in order:

• February 7 — Craig Jones announced Craig Jones vs. Dillon Danis as the CJI 3 main event, billed as deciding "the greatest grappler in the world." No date or location was given (BJJEE).
• March — the "we can coexist" detente with ADCC and the $10M purse talk covered in the analysis below.
• May 27 — Jones cancelled the event, in a Reddit reply on r/bjj: "cancelled. Decided to keep the money." He added that "CJI 2 broke the f**k even", that a deal with the UFC was on the table but would have meant selling "my soul, underpriced", and tore into UFC BJJ's amateur-funded model — the market shift he blamed for making independent purse events unsustainable (BJJEE).
• July 11 — CJI 3 planning resurfaced, with expectations reset: "don't expect a million dollars again" (Jits Magazine).
• Mid-July — multiple outlets reported Jones had set CJI 3 back in motion, aiming to recapture the feel of the first event. As of this update there is still no date, no venue, and no card beyond Jones vs. Danis.

The deeper story this post identified — elite athletes migrating toward whoever actually pays — kept accelerating, but its center of gravity moved from CJI to UFC BJJ, which now runs monthly numbered events on exclusive contracts. The starkest data point landed today: Adele Fornarino, the 2024 ADCC double champion, withdrew from ADCC 2026, citing women's purses at half the men's rate, the quiet removal of the women's absolute and women's superfight, and the math of two years' preparation for "maybe breaking even." Her stated destination of choice: UFC BJJ, "one of the only promotions… putting four female matches on in one night."

The original May analysis follows, preserved as published, with inline notes where events overtook it.

The Pay Map of Pro Grappling Just Moved

Two stories in the last month say more about where pro grappling is heading than any single match result.

First, Craig Jones confirmed that the next individual Craig Jones Invitational — CJI 3 — will not go head-to-head with ADCC 2026, walking back the format-versus-format collision that defined the calendar in 2024. "We can coexist," Jones told media, and floated a $10 million total purse for CJI 3 (BJJEE coverage, Jits Magazine, BJJ Doc).

Second, Ana Vieira — a six-time IBJJF World Champion — said publicly she will not compete at IBJJF Worlds again, explicitly citing pay. She had been part of the $100,000 women's bracket at CJI 2 in 2025.

Those are two unrelated headlines on the surface. Read together, they are the same story: the top end of the black-belt talent pool is migrating away from prestige-only events and toward purse-paying ones, and CJI is engineering itself to be the place that pool migrates to. That changes everything from how athletes plan their season to which event you actually want to watch.

For the technical context on Jones and the system he built — separate from the business story here — see our Craig Jones and B-Team breakdown.

"We Can Coexist" — The CJI / ADCC Detente

Update, October 2026: this detente framing lasted until May 27, when Jones cancelled CJI 3 outright. ADCC's September 12-13 weekend in Krakow came and went with no CJI event anywhere near it, and CJI 3 remains undated.

The CJI-versus-ADCC head-to-head weekend in 2024 was a generational event in pro grappling: two top-tier no-gi cards, scheduled on top of each other, splitting the talent pool between two stages. It was great theatre, terrible scheduling.

What changed in 2026:

• No conflict weekend. Jones confirmed CJI 3 will be a different calendar slot from ADCC 2026 in Kraków (September 12-13 at TAURON Arena).
• Athletes can do both. That is the explicit pitch — the same black belt can take an ADCC invitation and then take a CJI 3 contract.
• Promotion-vs-promotion economics shift. Without a forced choice between events, the lever Jones has to attract talent is no longer "pick us, not them." It is purse size, and that is where CJI is leaning all the weight.

The $10 million figure is the headline. Whether the final CJI 3 purse lands exactly there is a question — it's a stated number, not a deposited one — but the direction is the point. Even a partial realization of that number puts CJI's per-athlete payouts at multiples of what IBJJF Worlds gold has historically paid the same competitor. (IBJJF black-belt majors do not award a cash purse to gold medalists; the income for IBJJF champions comes from sponsorship, instructionals, and seminar circuits that follow the title.)

CJI 2.5 — The July Bridge Event

Update, August 2026: CJI 2.5 never materialized. No card, date, or venue was ever announced, and the May cancellation swallowed the July window. The section is preserved as originally published.

Between CJI 2 (Las Vegas, August 30-31, 2025) and CJI 3, Jones is running a one-day bridge card: CJI 2.5.

• Date. July 2026 (a specific date is pending public confirmation as of publication).
• Format. Single day. Eight competitors.
• Broadcast. Free on YouTube.

CJI 2.5 fills two strategic roles. It keeps the CJI brand in the news cycle through the second half of 2026 — important when ADCC takes over the no-gi conversation in September — and it gives Jones a live-fire test of a leaner card format. Eight competitors on one day is the kind of card that can travel internationally without the production overhead of CJI 2's full team and individual format. Watch for whether CJI 2.5 ends up looking like the template for CJI 3.

The Athlete Pay Migration

The Ana Vieira announcement is the loudest example, but it is not the only one.

Vieira's specific case

Vieira holds six IBJJF World titles. Her stated reason for walking away from Worlds is that the financial reward at the elite end of the gi calendar does not match what she can earn on a purse card like CJI. She competed in the $100,000 women's bracket at CJI 2 in 2025 — the largest women's no-gi tournament purse on record at the time. That bracket was won by Helena Crevar; the other competitors were Adele Fornarino, Vieira, and Sarah Galvão. Even a runner-up cheque on that bracket is meaningful money.

Update, October 2026: three of those four reached the ADCC 2026 podium in Krakow. Crevar won +65 kg gold, Vieira defended her -65 kg title, and Galvão took silver behind her. Fornarino withdrew from ADCC in August.

Why CJI 2's women's bracket matters more in hindsight

A year ago, the $100K women's tournament read like a marketing line item — a one-off, designed to generate headlines and parity-credit for CJI 2. With the Vieira announcement, that read changes. The bracket established a comparable for women's no-gi pay; once a comparable exists, every athlete who could plausibly be invited has a number to negotiate against. That negotiating leverage is what's actually moving athletes off the IBJJF Worlds register.

For tracking which black belts are still on the IBJJF qualification track versus migrating to ADCC and CJI, see our ADCC 2026 qualified athletes list — the full Krakow field and how each athlete fared.

What this signals for IBJJF Worlds 2026

IBJJF Worlds runs May 28-31 in Long Beach, four days after this post. The field is still loaded — see our Worlds 2026 preview and predictions — but the pattern visible in Vieira's announcement is the one to track over the next two seasons:

1. Black belts who have already won a Worlds title are the most likely to skip subsequent years.
2. Younger black belts still building a competition résumé will keep entering, because the Worlds title remains the prestige asset even when it is not the pay asset.
3. The slow-motion outcome is a Worlds field where the most accomplished names are absent or selective, while the next wave fights to take their place.

That is not a crisis — it is how every major sport's championship eventually rebalances — but it is a measurable shift in who you see on the brackets in 2027 and 2028.

B-Team, CJI, and the Post-CJI 2 Reset

Some background that informs the business story without being the business story:

• Jones formally retired from competition after CJI 2 in 2025 and signaled a wind-down of the B-Team Jiu Jitsu brand.
• Update, October 2026: the Austin academy did not carry on as B-Team. After CJI 2 the gym changed hands and now operates as Simple Man Martial Arts, with Nicky Ryan as head coach (Wikipedia; the remaining members had described the change as "just a transfer of ownership" in July 2025, per BJJEE). Several of B-Team's high-profile athletes have continued to compete under their own banners. In July 2026 Jones shared an early look at Zamaya, a training resort in Mexico's Mayan jungle that BJJEE reported is set to become B-Team's new home (BJJEE).
• Jones is now functionally a full-time promoter and ringmaster of the CJI brand — the move from "athlete with a tournament" to "promoter with a network" is what makes the $10M purse statement legible. He is not personally fighting on the line.

For the technical and cultural story of B-Team in its competitive prime — distinct from the current promoter arc — see our Craig Jones and B-Team no-gi system breakdown.

Common Questions

When is CJI 3?

There is no date or venue as of October 18, 2026, and no CJI event has been held in 2026. Jones cancelled the event outright on May 27 ("cancelled. Decided to keep the money."), told fans in July that "CJI's back," and on October 15 posted an Instagram reel captioned "Sold my soul for CJI 3. Maybe." The Craig Jones vs. Dillon Danis main event, announced in February, remains the only confirmed piece of the card.

Is CJI 3 really a $10 million purse?

Treat the $10M figure as historical. It was the stated ambition in March; after the cancellation-and-revival cycle, Jones' own July guidance was "don't expect a million dollars again." As of October 18, no purse structure has been announced.

Did the same athletes do ADCC 2026 and CJI 3?

Not in 2026. ADCC 2026 went ahead on September 12-13 in Krakow — see our ADCC 2026 results and champions — while CJI 3 stayed undated, so there was no clash and no shared season to plan around. CJI 2 alumni still starred in Krakow: Helena Crevar and Ana Carolina Vieira won gold and Sarah Galvão took silver.

Why is Ana Vieira walking from IBJJF Worlds?

In her own words, pay. The IBJJF major calendar pays prestige; purse cards like CJI pay cash. Vieira had already competed in the $100K women's bracket at CJI 2 in 2025.

Is the athlete-pay migration still happening?

Yes — and it widened beyond IBJJF. In August 2026, 2024 ADCC double champion Adele Fornarino withdrew from ADCC 2026 itself, citing women's purses at half the men's rate and the removal of the women's absolute and superfight, and pointed to UFC BJJ as the promotion giving women equal billing. In Krakow the women's purse stayed at half the men's: $10,000 for a women's division title against $20,000 for the men (FloGrappling). Defending +65 kg champion Rafaela Guedes also withdrew in late August; FloGrappling's report gave no reason. By October Fornarino was fighting for UFC BJJ gold: at UFC BJJ 12 she lost a title match to Cassia Moura that drew judging controversy, and Moura became the promotion's first two-division champion (MMA Mania). The migration this post identified now flows mostly toward UFC BJJ's contracted, monthly model.

Where does this leave WNO, Polaris, and Fight to Win?

Each promotion has its own niche — WNO under FloGrappling, Polaris in the UK (now also on FloGrappling for 2026), Fight to Win as the high-volume open-format show. The bigger 2026 force is UFC BJJ, whose monthly numbered events and exclusive contracts are what Jones himself cited when cancelling CJI 3 — see our breakdown of the UFC BJJ, Polaris, and FloGrappling realignment.

Sources

• BJJEE — Craig Jones vs. Dillon Danis announced to headline CJI 3 (February 2026)
• BJJEE — Craig Jones confirms CJI 3 is cancelled as UFC BJJ reshapes the market (May 2026)
• Jits Magazine — Craig Jones' CJI 3 update: "Don't expect a million dollars again" (July 2026)
• BJJEE — Craig Jones on CJI 3: "CJI's back" (July 2026)
• Craig Jones on Instagram — "Sold my soul for CJI 3. Maybe." (October 15, 2026)
• FloGrappling — ADCC 2026 FAQ and prize money (September 2026)
• FloGrappling — ADCC 2026 results and brackets (September 2026)
• BJJEE — Adele Fornarino withdraws from ADCC 2026 (August 2026)
• BJJEE — Craig Jones: no CJI vs ADCC clash, "we can coexist" (March 2026)
• BJJ Doc — Craig Jones defends the $10M purse (March 2026)
• BJJEE — Ana Vieira on never competing at IBJJF Worlds again
• Wikipedia — Craig Jones Invitational — event history and prior purse figures

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