[Aesopian]

My initial counter to the scissors pass has been to not let my knee get crushed. Avoidance is always my first choice. They have to pin my knees together to get this pass to really work. So...

- I simply keep my knee shallow on their hip bone (instead of putting it across their stomach where they can lay on it). It's hard to crush the knee down from here.
- I keep the angle of my knee pointed up, since it's weaker when I have my knee sideway.
- To stop the sprawl, I've been crossing my ankles and pulling their leg in. (I'll now try the "turns toes down" point Zankou stresses.)
- I keep control of the crossfacing arm since they also need it to push the knee down to setup the pass.
- When they start reaching back to thread their arm through, I can grab their triceps and pull it to me so they can't reach deeply.
- Or I can take my knee off the hip and go to normal half guard.
- I can also bring my knee up to their chest or switch to Gustavo's quarter guard.

If they do pin my legs together, I push the face/head to the side, scoot back, sit up, get on my elbow/hand and try to pull my top leg out. From here I can reset my guard or do a slick armdrag to the back.

And Zankou, great list of options. I've been thinking of my basic moves from long distance half guard and that looks like a good collection.