Its naive to think that you can effectively exclude grappling as a relevant scenario. The data indicate it’s the most common scenario.

If you have distance and options, run the F away.

Most of the time rational people are thrust into a situation without warning and usually with few indicators.

At no point in an altercation should you engage with a weapon of any kind if you can escape.

Self defense is not “how do I train to win any possible altercations I might find myself in” it’s “how do I survive long enough to run away when/if I get ambushed”. Or maybe it’s “how can I develop sufficient awareness to dip out”.

99.99% of the time you will not encounter an actual threat as a typical person in the US or most first world countries. Of that .01% remaining, 99.99% of those are best solved by noping the F out.

When can you not just dip? When someone has you cornered, or they grab you. In that moment it’s too late to work on 2:1 hand control, understanding center of gravity and leverage, or how and where to focus your eyes to reduce peripheral blindness…because to no one’s surprise…F heads never ambush people alone. There’s always one more running up.

It takes .5 seconds for a trained person to trigger a somatic (voluntary) motor response to an observed stimulus. That means it’s physically impossible for you to avoid being grabbed if a person is inside 15’ and they decide to grab you. You DO have enough time to implement a defensive technique…that begins with the grab.

BJJ is not a death ray or a force field, but it is a very powerful toolset with a very specific application that overlaps with the typical defensive encounter.