The dual role of pins: a huge part of jiu jitsu's approach to combat is PINNING. Pins are defined as positions where you have gotten past your opponents legs and are pinning him with chest or knee, or you have taken his back and locked yourself in place using your legs as hooks into his hips. The first role of pins is NEGATION. These positions strongly negate your opponents ability to attack you. As such they create a highly desirable asymmetry between your ability to attack them (very high) and their ability to attack you (very low). The second is PRESSURE. Pins allow for great tactical pressure because if you attempt a submission and fail, you still have the position and so can simply try again and again until you succeed. They also allow great mechanical pressure because you can severely interrupt their breathing and apply severe and direct pressure to the head and the opponent cannot use his legs to relieve this pressure. These two features of pinning allow you to enter into the most important aspect of pinning in jiu jitsu with regards submissions – the notion of switching from PINNING THE TORSO to ISOLATING A LIMB. Only when you make this transition do pins become related to submission. This must always be your goal, if not your pins are merely a method of holding people rather than a devastating method of enforcing submission.
