Tye Ruotolo

Tye Ruotolo was born on January 22, 2003, in Maui, Hawaii, of Italian and Puerto Rican heritage. Raised in Huntington Beach, California with twin brother Kade, he began Brazilian jiu-jitsu at age three under Cleber Luciano and entered competition almost immediately. Backed by parents deeply invested in the sport, the brothers became known as grappling’s first child stars—earning a major RVCA sponsorship by age ten—and trained for nearly four years at Art of Jiu-Jitsu (AOJ) under Guilherme and Rafael Mendes before moving to Atos Headquarters in San Diego in 2017, where André Galvão oversaw their development from green belt through black belt.

As a teenager Tye already competed against adult professionals. At 15 he reached the semifinals of the 2018 East Coast ADCC Trials as a blue belt; in 2019, still 16, he was invited to the ADCC World Championship in Anaheim and finished fourth at −66 kg after beating Bruno Frazatto and Pablo Mantovani, then falling to Kennedy Maciel and Paulo Miyao—the youngest athlete to reach an ADCC World semifinal at the time. Galvão promoted him blue (April 2018), purple (December 2019), brown (October 2020), and black belt on December 14, 2021 (same day as Kade). In the brown-belt lightweight final of the 2021 IBJJF World Championship he submitted Kade by armbar; as a black belt he quickly became a two-division Who’s Number One champion (185 lb in 2021, defeating Mica Galvão in the final; 170 lb in 2022 via kneebar over Levi Jones-Leary).

At the 2022 IBJJF World Championship Tye took silver at lightweight after losing the final to Mica Galvão on points, then was declared world champion when Galvão’s title was vacated following a USADA positive for clomiphene—making Ruotolo the youngest IBJJF black-belt World champion in history. At ADCC 2022 he exited early at −88 kg to teammate Josh Hinger but ran deep in absolute: submitting Pedro Marinho, beating Felipe Pena on penalties, losing a decision to Nicholas Meregali in the semifinals, and earning bronze after Roberto “Cyborg” Abreu medically forfeited the third-place match. In 2023 he won bronze at IBJJF Worlds middleweight; in 2024 he and Kade withdrew from ADCC to enter the inaugural Craig Jones Invitational under-80 kg bracket, where Tye submitted Jason Nolf before losing a decision to Levi Jones-Leary in the quarterfinals.

Signed to ONE Championship, Ruotolo debuted at ONE 157 (May 2022) by submitting Garry Tonon with a D’Arce choke in under two minutes. He later submitted Marat Gafurov and Dagi Arslanaliev, decisioned Reinier de Ridder, and won the inaugural ONE Welterweight Submission Grappling World Title against Magomed Abdulkadirov at ONE Fight Night 16 (November 2023). He has defended that belt multiple times—including submissions or decisions over Izaak Michell, Dante Leon, and Pawel Jaworski—while remaining undefeated in ONE grappling. In late 2025 he crossed into MMA for ONE, submitting Adrian Lee (ONE Fight Night 35) and Shozo Isojima (ONE 173) by rear-naked choke. His game is defined by scramble-heavy top pressure, leg-pin guard passing, and finishing threats such as the D’Arce, kneebar, and arm-in rear-naked choke variants (including the “Ruotolo-tine”).