Did Mark Zuckerberg Get Choked Out? An Investigation.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg really, really doesn’t want you to think he was choked unconscious during a recent Brazilian jiu-jitsu match. 

For readers only aware of Zuckerberg’s professional life, such as a wild pivot to the metaverse and election disinformation, the Facebook founder has gotten slightly yoked and really into BJJ, the thinking man’s mid-life crisis sport. 

A recent article in the New York Times decided to analyze his sporting habits, but has been shrouded in controversy as a BJJ referee said he oversaw a match where Zuckerberg was forced into going night night (they don’t mention what the exact choke hold was.).

“José Lucas Costa da Silva, a veteran Brazilian jujitsu fighter who refereed one of Mr. Zuckerberg’s matches, said that he halted the bout after he heard Mr. Zuckerberg start to snore, a sign of someone who has passed out in a choke hold,” reads the line that so offended Zuckerberg. The section goes on to say the Zuck was “a good sport” about the whole situation. 

Zuckerberg immediately did a full-court press to deny this happened and deployed not just his press people but his jiu-jitsu coach—an absolute killer, by the way—Dave Camarillo. Unsurprisingly, Zuckerberg’s denial of being choked unconscious in the competition begot the Streisand Effect and resulted in headlines like “Mark Zuckerberg REALLY doesn’t want you to know he was choked out by an Uber engineer" and “Do You Have Video of Mark Zuckerberg Getting Choked Out?” 

So, we here at VICE News decided to get in on the action and thought, who better to investigate a man possibly being choked unconscious for sport, than someone who gets choked on the regular during sport? That would be me of course. 

Like Big Zuck, I’m a white belt who has been training for a little over a year now. I’m fully obsessed with BJJ and like Zuckerberg, I recently had a good showing at a tournament (4-0 and two golds, not to brag.) I also happen to be an investigative journalist.

This Very Serious Investigation is going to start in the same place as all good investigations, the basics. So what do we know? We know Zuckerberg has been training over a year now (as he told Joe Rogan in a podcast last August), is a white belt, and he competed at the BJJ Tour Silicon Valley tournament in early May. Zuckerberg participated in the adult division at 155 pounds under the name Mark Eliott (his middle name.) We can see that he only competed in both gi and no gi (a gi is a traditional wear for jiu-jitsu, the big thick uniform). In no-gi (where you typically wear shorts and a tight sports top) he competed against only one opponent, and in gi, he was in a bracket that had four people. The tournament information does not have the results of individual matches. 

If you’re willing to look, there are actually several videos of Zuckerberg competing. 

So let's take a look at no-gi where he competed in three matches against the same man. We have footage of two of these matches, one where Zuck wins, and one where he loses. Neither end via submission and both are decided via points because they go over the time limit. Since Zuckerberg took first in this division, he must have won the match we don’t have footage for, so that the final tally is 2-1. Thus, we can safely eliminate the no-gi tournament as the source of the “Zuckerberg was choked or not choked out” match.  

The available footage shows Zuckerberg to be a competent grappler, albeit one with weak takedown defence, and he actually hits a very nice sweep to mount at one point. He’s not good by any professional measure (like me!) but he’s pretty aggressive.

It’s here in the gi bracket, we have the footage I’ve started to call the “Zuckpruder film.” The clip that may break this case wide open. While I can’t unequivocally say that this is the match that’s at the heart of the matter, the clip does show Zuckerberg being submitted and then immediately arguing with the referee. 

In the match, Zuckerberg is challenging an opponent who is obviously a bit better than him. The Harvard pulls guard (meaning he drops to his ass and pulls his his legs around his opponent's torso and locks them.) While it may seem counter-intuitive, since Zuckerberg is on his back, he’s actually the one in the dominant position here. The rest of the two-minute match stayed like this and then it suddenly ends—you can even hear the people in the audience in the video question what happened. Since the combatants  are facing away from the camera it’s hard to tell if it is due to a Zuckerberg tapping out or a ref saying Zuck had taken a forced nap.

Zuckerberg still had a closed guard at the match's conclusion but his opponent appears to be putting on pressure. This is odd as you really shouldn’t be submitted from your closed guard, since you’re in the dominant position. My best (uneducated) guess is that his opponent had some form of top position cross-collar choke and that, paired with the pressure, is the reason for the stoppage. Not an ideal way to lose a match if it is the case, but, hey, it happens! 

What can be easily seen is Zuck is none too pleased with the result.  

After the ref calls it, the competitors look a bit confused and Zuck bounces up quickly, which you don’t typically see from someone who was recently unconscious. At no point in the video does Zuckerberg seem to cease movements—trust me I looked and hoped. He has a disgruntled open mouth look and seems to argue with the ref as his opponent's hand is raised. Eventually, he embraces his opponent, and the video ends. 

According to the New York Post, the match was eventually changed to a 0-0 draw which lends itself to the idea that the ref made the wrong call, or Zuck called in his extremely busy lawyers. Zuckerberg likely had more matches in this bracket and while the incident may have occurred there, all available evidence points to it happening in this particular match. In the end his opponent got first place in the bracket and Zuckerberg took second out of four, which is a valiant showing! 

Speaking to the New York Times, the referee said he halted the match because he heard Zuckerberg snoring, a classic sign of someone passing out. Zuckerberg’s people responded saying it never happened and Zuck was just doing a little “effortful grunting.” The noises you make as you’re being choked and struggling to breathe while fighting it off do sound like snoring… or at least they have during the countless times it has happened to me.

So this leads us to our very unsatisfying conclusion. One that most people likely don't want—the idea of the CEO of a company that may or may not have ruined democracy being choked unconscious and then desperately trying to sweep it under the rug is a great story and very funny—but we deal in facts, not fantasy, in our Extra Super Very Serious Investigations. 

So, in conclusion, from the evidence we have available to us, it seems most likely that Zuckerberg wasn’t choked unconscious in this case. 

That said, buddy’s gotta work on that closed guard.