From Slump to Streak: The remarkable rise of middleweight contender Dustin Jacoby

Almost everyone who spends any time with Dustin Jacoby comes away with a good opinion of him. He is likable, humorous and personable. People around him talk about his good character. But none of that amiability stopped him being written off by fans, when his TKO loss in his GLORY 5 LONDON debut was followed by four more defeats in a row.

In a way, Jacoby was a victim of his own success. He found himself in GLORY after accepting a late call-up to an eight-man, one-night ‘Road to Glory’ tournament. Those tournaments were staged in GLORY’s early years in a bid to unearth new US talent. Jacoby got 48 hours notice to enter a light-heavyweight contest in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He immediately stopped eating and drinking, got in the car, turned the heat up high and drove through the night to make the weigh-ins, undergoing a mobile weight-cut along the way.

Improbably, he then stopped three opponents back-to-back, a brutal run which commenced with his elimination of tournament favorite Randy ‘Boom Boom’ Blake in the quarter-finals. Having thus impressed GLORY, who were desperate to find a US breakout fighter, he was matched with Michael Duut for GLORY 5. Duut began training at 10 years old and competed for Amsterdam institution Meijiro Gym; he stopped Jacoby in the very first round.

Jacoby bounced back with a win over fellow American Brian Collette but then found himself facing former light-heavyweight #1 Danyo Ilunga in his next outing. He lost a decision. This would be the first of a five-fight losing streak which took him from June 2013 to April 2015 and had him roundly written off by the online fanbase, despite two of the losses – Makoto Uehara at GLORY 13 TOKYO, Mike Lemaire at GLORY 17 LOS ANGELES – being highly debatable decisions.

Fans questioned why Jacoby remained on the roster. GLORY matchmaker Cor Hemmers talked about Jacoby’s performances being “spirited” and said this counted for a lot, although it was also difficult to escape the suggestion that Jacoby being American gave him added protection, with US kickboxers being thin on the ground at the time. They were hard times for Jacoby, but his focus remained strong.

“I didn’t really pay a whole lot of attention to what was being said, to be honest with you. I mean yeah, it sucks when people are saying certain things but I care about the people I love and who love me and I am not concerned about anyone else. Their opinions don’t matter to me. I know who I am and what I am capable …

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