Eddie Bravo: ‘The Main Goal of the Eddie Bravo Invitational is to Get Jiu-Jitsu on Network T.V.’

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The third edition of the Eddie Bravo Invitational returns on Sunday with a live video stream and bigger venue in tow.

EBI 3, which takes place at the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles, features a 16-man tournament of 170 pounders who will be vying for $10,000 and Gary Tonon’s championship crown. The event streams live on BudoVideos pay-per-view for $14.99.

The jiu-jitsu tournament’s founder, Eddie Bravo spoke with Sherdog.com about his upcoming event and what he hopes ultimately comes of it. He couldn’t be more pleased with the first two shows and how they turned out, which has lead to the minor tweaks heading into Sunday.

“EBI 1 and EBI 2 were so good -- especially if you were there and got to watch them all one by one -- We all got lucky with the first two events,” Bravo told Sherdog.com. “They could have gone bad, you just never know. We definitely will have a show eventually that will be a little bland, but that’s what happens when you are having shows regularly.”

The driving incentive for the competitors on Sunday will obviously be winning, but it doesn’t hurt that Bravo will award $2,500 to grapplers who finish their opponent during regulation -- not overtime. As the show continues to grow, Bravo hopes the prize money does also.

“Hopefully, as the money increases, the guarantee for an exciting show gets stronger. Right now it’s a $10,000 grand prize and the winner only gets paid for winning the bout in regulation,” Bravo said. “Every match is worth $2,500 bucks. Ultimately, I want the matches to be worth $25,000 and the grand prize be $100,000. As long as we keep moving up and growing like we are doing, it will happen.”

Many fans of Bravo and his academy 10th Planet Jiu-Jitsu have wondered when the event would make its way to the internet. The previous two were available on YouTube, but did not air live and were put up sometimes months after the card had taken place. According to Bravo, this was all by design.

“EBI 3 is the first event we are going to stream live worldwide with BudoVideos.com. They have streaming down, we didn’t want to f--k around until we were ready,” Bravo said. “We could have streamed the first two, but we wanted to practice a little bit and make sure do some post-editing to make it look good for television. Now, we are ready and everyone that pays $14.99 will see that.”

Of course the Metamoris 3 headliner wants his event to succeed, but in the grand scheme of things, Bravo hopes that he can bring more mainstream attention to jiu-jitsu and do away with Internet streams altogether. Mainly by putting future EBI events on network television.

“We do it with practically no budget, it’s just me and my partner. We only lost like $10,000 to do those shows. We shoestringed it, we are basically putting together a pilot,” Bravo said. “The main goal is to get jiu-jitsu on Spike or Fox or any network for that matter. What do we have to do to get that to happen? What the f--k do we have to do?”

While the rule set remains the same, minor alterations to the show’s format include the decision to only hold one tournament instead of two and the inclusion of three super fights which will take place in between rounds of the competition.

“The one thing we did change this event is to only hold tournament at a time instead of two 16-man tournaments,” Bravo explained. “Some people had bad tastes in their mouths from the length of the show. We figured that one out after the first two shows. After going through four 16-man tournaments, we wanted to narrow it down to one and then include three super fights with teens. The super fights will be used to break up the rounds of the tournament.”

Bravo also had an answer for any critics who claim that these events are merely showcases for his best jiu-jitsu practitioners and don’t feature the absolute best competition possible.

“I do want to promote my 10th Planet guys, absolutely,” Bravo said. “But I am getting the best guys in the world to compete against them. Of course I want to showcase them, I want to show our best guys against the best of the rest of the world.”

The future seems to be bright for the Eddie Bravo Invitational and its founder. When asked about when fans can expect to see some of his Ultimate Fighting Championship competitors enter the tournament, Bravo said it will happen sooner rather than later. As far as him competing again, Bravo didn’t commit to it as he’s currently recovering from a back injury sustained during training.

Full coverage of the third Eddie Bravo Invitational will be available on Sherdog.com, as we will be in-person providing results, commentary and photos in real-time.