Fast facts
- Division: Welterweight (ONE submission grappling champion); challenging for the ONE lightweight MMA title
- Record: 11-0 combined in ONE Championship (nine submission grappling wins, two MMA wins), per onefc.com
- Nationality: American (born in Maui, Hawaii; raised in Huntington Beach, California)
- Team/gym: Atos Jiu-Jitsu; black belt under André Galvão
- Notable wins: Garry Tonon, Marat Gafurov, Reinier de Ridder, Magomed Abdulkadirov, Dante Leon, Micael Galvão (WNO), Adrian Lee (MMA)
A few weeks before the biggest fight of his life, Tye Ruotolo was in a room in Los Angeles at a sponsor event, with no mat on the floor, watching his twin brother Kade walk Lionel Messi’s bodyguard through a standing Mir Lock. The bodyguard, Yassine Cheuko, learned it fast enough to tap Kade with it on camera. Tye told onefc.com he enjoyed the whole thing, and he said of Cheuko: “He’s got martial arts in his heart, for sure.”
That’s a nice line coming from someone who has been on the mats since he was three. On Friday, November 6, at Lumpinee Stadium in Bangkok, Ruotolo headlines The Inner Circle 37 against two-division ONE champion Christian Lee for the lightweight MMA title. If he wins, he becomes the first ONE fighter to hold world titles in both submission grappling and MMA.
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Twins from Huntington Beach
Ruotolo was born January 22, 2003, in Maui, to a family of Italian and Puerto Rican heritage, and grew up in Huntington Beach, California. He and Kade started competing at age three. By 10 they had an RVCA sponsorship, and the grappling world was calling them “grappling’s first child-stars.”
The part of the story that usually gets skipped is the four years they spent at the Art of Jiu-Jitsu academy under Guilherme and Rafael Mendes. Those are the people who shaped a pair of kids into competitors before anyone was filming them for sponsors. In 2017 the twins moved to Atos, the team AOJ was affiliated with, and André Galvão became the name on their belts. He promoted both brothers to brown in October 2020 and to black on December 14, 2021.
Before that black belt there was a moment at the 2021 IBJJF Worlds that sounds invented and isn’t: Tye met Kade in the brown belt lightweight final and armbarred him.
The 16-year-old at ADCC
The first time most of the grappling world really looked at Tye Ruotolo, he was a 16-year-old blue belt entered in the lightweight division at the 2019 ADCC World Championship, the youngest competitor the event had ever had. He beat Bruno Frazatto and Pablo Mantovani, then lost to Kennedy Maciel in the semifinal.
The bronze medal match against Paulo Miyao is the one people still bring up. Ruotolo caught Miyao in a kneebar. Miyao wouldn’t tap, the knee suffered long-term damage, and Ruotolo lost on points anyway. He finished fourth. A teenager learning on that stage what a hold can do to a man who refuses to concede it is a heavy thing, and it belongs in any honest account of his career.
A black belt in a hurry
Ruotolo spent his early black belt years taking on the best grapplers available, often at weights well above his own. In September 2021 he won the WNO 185-pound title by beating Johnny Tama, Dante Leon and Micael Galvão. In January 2022 he added the WNO 170-pound belt by kneebarring Levi Jones.
At the 2022 IBJJF Worlds he lost the black belt lightweight final to Galvão on points. Galvão later tested positive for clomiphene, and Ruotolo was named world champion, which made him the youngest IBJJF black belt world champion ever.
The 2022 ADCC shows his appetite most clearly. He dropped his first-round match at 88 kg to Josh Hinger, his mentor and teammate, in overtime. Then he entered the absolute, beat Pedro Marinho and Felipe Pena, and lost a judges’ decision to Nicholas Meregali. He took bronze when Cyborg Abreu medically forfeited. A 2023 Worlds bronze at middleweight followed. In 2024 the twins withdrew from ADCC to enter the under-80 kg bracket at the first Craig Jones Invitational, where Tye submitted Jason Nolf and then lost a referee decision to Levi Jones-Leary.
Look at how he wins and the range is wide: D’Arce, triangle armbar, kneebar, armbar, rear-naked choke. He’ll also grind out decisions against serious names when the finish doesn’t come.
The ONE run
His ONE debut on May 20, 2022, at ONE 157 took 97 seconds. He choked Garry Tonon with a D’Arce. That December he caught former ONE featherweight champion Marat Gafurov in a triangle armbar at a 180-pound catchweight. Reinier de Ridder went the distance and lost a unanimous decision in May 2023, and Ruotolo used his post-fight interview to call out Meregali. He rear-naked choked Dagi Arslanaliev that August.
On November 3, 2023, he beat Magomed Abdulkadirov by decision for the inaugural ONE welterweight submission grappling title and a $50,000 bonus. He defended it against Izaak Michell with an arm-in rear-naked choke in April 2024 (that finish shared Submission of the Year honors with Kade’s win over Francisco Lo), beat Jozef Chen by decision at catchweight that July, and outpointed Dante Leon in a May 2025 title defense. That’s four Performance of the Night bonuses along the way.
The MMA turn
The MMA part was in his ONE contract from the start. The twins said they’d debut before the end of 2023, though Tye’s first pro fight didn’t come until September 5, 2025, at ONE Fight Night 35. He submitted Adrian Lee, Christian’s younger brother, with a rear-naked choke, giving Adrian his first professional loss. ONE now credits him with two MMA wins.
That is the honest tension in this fight. I don’t usually have patience for title shots handed out on a couple of wins, and two pro MMA fights is a thin résumé to bring against a man who has spent a decade winning belts in two weight classes. Lee’s most recent defense came against Alibeg Rasulov. But Ruotolo isn’t a typical prospect. He has been competing under pressure since before he could read, against grown men at the highest level of his sport, and Lee will be facing someone who can win from almost any position on the mat. The question is whether he can get Lee there, and whether he can handle the pace on the feet until he does. Nothing in his record answers that yet.
The family stakes are obvious. Lee has a chance to settle things for his brother. Ruotolo has a chance to beat both Lees and leave with gold in two sports.
The fight goes off at 6:30 a.m. ET on November 6. Hours later, on the same Lumpinee canvas, Lucas Gabriel and the unbeaten Magomed Magomedov headline ONE Fight Night 49, knowing exactly whose lightweight belt they’re chasing. Then on December 18, Kade, 10-0 in ONE, faces former lightweight champion Ok Rae Yoon at ONE Fight Night 50. The twins have shared a mat for 20 years, and this winter they get their biggest tests back to back.
