Looks like "Prof. Bankens", at least the one from the profile you linked to, is registered as a 4-stripe white belt, and he's included a diploma from Edmilson Alves as proof. The diploma states that he's actually a 4th degree black belt.

Do you have a link to the forum thread you referenced earlier?

It is an old Forum where someone was looking into his background and then Bankens himself came on to defend himself.

https://forums.sherdog.co[...]s.1349233/

Just wandering where this leaves the original profile that i was looking to vote on. Both her photos and certificate show Kevin Bankens signing off on the Black belt. If he cannot keep his linage straight how can we validate anyone who is under him regardless of their actual skill. Again I do not question the original profile, just the connection to Bankens.

Also I cannot find much on William Kevin Carpenter except that he claims to be a black belt under Pedro Carvalho. Also claims to have been under Alvaro Barreto, but the list of BB under Barreto is short (30 or so)

Maybe I should stop looking I am feeling a little like Johan at this point!!!

This thread is so awesome lol. Thanks for brightening my day. I was feeling all salty because I have a cold sore at bjj camp so I can't roll at all.

Maybe that is why i was salty today! I have a chest cold so I couldn't go to train.....

Kevin Bankens promoted by the same Randy Roger which he is shown to criticize in the forum thread linked below? Seems like someone needs to get his lineage straight.

https://www.beltchecker.c[...]p;id=30770

Also found this thread on Randy "Lasu" Roger. https://www.beltchecker.c[...]f368d47427

The easiest job Master Ken ever had to make fun of someone's technique. "We're going to hang that a little bit lower just for...hmmm... camera purposes." 🤣🤣🤣 He literally just repeated what Kevin did and it was still hilarious.

Also: I've done only about 6 years of judo in total here and there but I can't remember having "degrees" on kyu grades. Again I'm only a humble green belt in judo and it might be different in America.

Has any one tried to call that number he gave? We could get all the answers we need.

In the US system, we have 3 brown belts (sankyu, nikkyu, ikkyu),

In some traditions, you will receive stripes on your belt to tell the difference between the three: 2 stripes = sankyu, 1 stripe = nikkyu, 0 stripes = ikkyu.

My guess is that he's trying to communicate to us that he's a nikkyu, but he either assumes that nobody knows what that is, or, he doesn't actually know what it is and feels that saying "2nd degree brown belt" sounds sufficiently bad-ass enough.

👮‍♂️Johan take that case, stay home people it will be in order pretty soon

Sorry focusing on that OT point, but Judo is a part of my life for over 40 years now, more than 30 years as Yudansha (teaching-level). I spent a huge amount of time to study not only handed down techniques of todays Judo, but rather the history of Judo, its development and even originally rulesets and nearly forgotten techniques.
However:
No matter how you look at it, a nikkyu was always only a kind of mudansha (students-level). -No bad-ass at all. Sorry….💁🏻‍♂️

To translate for bjj folks:

Getting your shodan (1st black belt) in judo takes roughly 5 years or so, and is kind of like the equivalent of a purple belt in bjj (my opinion only).

This guy is saying he's two steps below black belt, so he's roughly on par with a ~2stripe blue belt... in judo terms.

I agree. I’m a second dan in judo and in my experience, it generally takes about 5 years in most judo gyms to earn a black belt (assuming you’re training 3+ days per week and don’t take any significant time off for injuries or other issues). A judo first-degree black belt is about the same as a BJJ purple belt in terms of time invested and overall skill level. (If you’re reading this and you haven’t trained in judo, please note that judo doesn’t have a zero-degree black belt like in BJJ. It jumps from first kyu, which is a brown belt, to first dan, which is the first degree of black belt.)

In USA Judo (the Olympic Judo organization in the U.S.), the belt colors are as follows: no rank, white belt; 6th kyu, yellow belt; 5th kyu, orange belt; 4th kyu, green belt; 3rd–1st kyu, brown belt. The reason that there are three kyu ranks that wear brown belts is that in Japan, they tend to use just three belt colors: white for beginners, brown for intermediate practitioners, and black for advanced athletes who are ready to do more serious training. The U.S. system uses yellow, orange, and green for ranks that are still white belts in Japan (because we crave instant gratification here :) ).

I started judo in 2007 and I have never heard a judo practitioner say, “I’m an X-degree brown belt.” Judoka typically describe rank using their kyu or dan grade rather than a belt color. The belt is just the thing you wear that (vaguely) displays your kyu/dan grade, but it’s not your actual rank. “Degrees” are for dan rank only, not kyu rank. I prefer BJJ’s system for belt colors because of its precision: you know exactly what a two-stripe brown belt (or black belt)in BJJ means, but in judo, a brown belt could be one of three ranks (and a black belt could be anywhere between first and fifth dan).