See seasoned Jiu-Jitsu pros, next-gen contenders Sept. 19
CRYSTAL LAKE — With a 54-athlete fight card featuring both legendary well-knowns and carefully curated next-gens, a tripled purse and a venue with a 1,000-spectator capacity, Jeff Curran knows his next invitational will pack plenty of thrills.
JCI 4: Night of Champions will bring 27 submission-only Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu matches to the mat at The MAC on Ridgefield Court in Crystal Lake Saturday, Sept. 19. Doors will open at 4 p.m., the pre-show starts at 5 p.m., and the livestreamed matches, including six title bouts, begin at 6 p.m., said Curran, a former UFC veteran, fifth-degree BJJ black belt and professor of the Curran Jiu-Jitsu Academy in Crystal Lake.
Tickets and other details, including the full fight card, are available at jcinvitational.com.
Curran — whose career now includes running nationwide camps and retreats as well as starring in and producing a YouTube series called “The Martial Life” — said he is excited about all of the pairings he has built from the hundreds of athletes who have applied from the U.S. and abroad since he started his invitational in 2025. But he is especially looking forward to welcoming McHenry County native Clay Guida, who now resides in Florida, to JCI 4.
“Having Clay Guida return home while welcoming athletes from across the United States and Japan speaks to how far JCI has come,” Curran said, noting that Guida will face JCI veteran Tim Shelton.
“We’re building more than an event,” Curran continued. “We’re building a championship platform where the best competitors in the world want to compete.”
Drawing its first international contender of the series to date, JCI 4 will feature Shooto Watanabe of Japan against local fighter Joey Diehl for the bantamweight title. Watanabe trains in the greater Tokyo area and is an athlete with DEEP Japan, an organization akin to a feeder for UFC.
Among the youngest to step onto the JCI mat this September will be Raphael “Rafa” Ferreira of Draper, Utah, who, at age 5, was not especially enamored with his new Jiu-Jitsu lessons. By age 18, though, he’d become a UFC Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competitor who won by submission in his debut professional match-up April 2. He then competed in JCI 3 in May, claiming the featherweight title, which he will defend this September, about a month after his 19th birthday.
Look Ferreira up online, and you may come across references to his “chaotic” fighting style.
“It might look like chaos to some people,” Ferreira said between bites of a post-training steak, rice and fruit meal in a recent phone interview. “But there’s a method to the madness.”
Also making his second JCI appearance this fall will be Crystal Lake Police Sgt. Adam Munaretto, whose introduction to Jiu-Jitsu arrived much later in life. When he was 40, with a newborn daughter and a new police department role as defensive tactics coordinator, Munaretto met a fifth-degree black belt who would change his trajectory.
“I got in a program with one of Jeff Curran’s black belts, John Hudson. In that class is where I fell in love with Jiu-Jitsu,” Munaretto said. “I love that you can be in an uncomfortable position, whether physically or in life in general, and learn that the finest of movements can improve your outlook.”
While his fight won’t be among the six title bouts in JCI 4, Munaretto, now 47, said he aims to perform well enough to earn such a spot in the future.
Gaining that sort of momentum and visibility is key for all of the JCI athletes, said Curran, who invests heavily in the production value of his events to help further the athletes’ goals. His YouTube livestream of JCI 3 has thousands of views, and overall impressions across all of his social media is up nearly 200 % since the last event in McHenry in May, he said.
“If you’re a competitor, you’re trying to get your name out there,” Curran said. “What better way to do it than to have people actually see you?”
To that end, JCI 4 will gain an extra camera angle for the free livestream, and, with room for 1,000, will feature more in-person seating capacity than any of Curran’s previous invitationals. Available tickets include everything from $45 general admission spots to a front-row, 10-person table for $1,000.
Curran added that The MAC, where he hosted his first invitational in September 2025, is an exceptional venue offering terrific food and drink. Between that and all of the powerhouse pairings on the fight card — including female UFC veteran Ashley Yoder vs. Taylor Meredith for the flyweight title and Jeff Serafin and Michael Mutter in the main event — Sept. 19 is sure to be one for the books.
Learn more about the Jeff Curran Invitational and find tickets at jcinvitational.com. For more about Curran’s retreats and other endeavors, visit bigfrogbjj.com.