Las Vegas, NV — It had been nearly a decade between UFC fights for Dustin Jacoby heading into UFC Vegas 12 on Saturday.
A couple of bouts inside the octagon in 2011 and 2012 didn’t go Jacoby’s way, putting a halt to a 6-0 streak to start his career. Suddenly, as quickly as he’d made it to the big leagues, he was gone.
It’s easy to jump to his triumphant return on Saturday, where Jacoby (13-5), now a light heavyweight, picked up an impressive knockout victory. That, however, would overlook what the 32-year old rightfully called “A decade’s worth of work.”
Speaking to media outlets including Cageside Press following the bout, Jacoby maintained that “I always knew I’d be back here.”
“I can finally say I’m a UFC fighter. Even though I won that Contender Series fight, it wasn’t a UFC fight,” he acknowledged. “I’ve been in the UFC, but I’ve never won. To get a win like that, it couldn’t have played out any better.”
Jacoby actually dropped opponent Justin Ledet with a leg kick, which set up the finish. “He started getting back up, I think when he was on the ground I kicked again. But when he started getting back up, I hit him with the shot that put him back down, hit him with a clean elbow, and I knew it was super close.”
The actual finishing blow was as picture perfect uppercut. “I honestly do not remember the uppercut,” admitted Jacoby. “My knuckle does, but I do not.”
Following the fight, Jacoby told former middleweight champ and current UFC analyst Michael Bisping that he was an inspiration. The reason for that, Jacoby explained post-fight, is “the long road” the Bisping traveled to get to the top. “The long journey. The ups and downs. And never giving up. The perseverance. The grit to continue on.”
With some guys, said Jacoby, “it comes early. They just hit it off right off the bat. Look at McGregor, rose to the top and was the man right away.” On the other hand, you have “a guy like Bisping that just went through the fire, the trials and tribulations for so many years, and then finally got that gold around his waist.”
It’s something Dustin Jacoby got to see first hand. “My last UFC fight prior to this one was UFC on FOX 2, and Michael Bisping lost to Chael Sonnen. And I lost to Chris Camozzi that night, it was January 28, 2012. To fight on the same card as him, and obviously he stayed in the UFC and had a great career, but to see him just climb to the top and finally get what he was chasing that whole time is a huge inspiration for me.”
Jacoby later told Cageside Press that he never gave up hope of returning. “I never once thought that. I was very fortunate enough, when I got cut, to get a promotion like GLORY. I was able to keep my career going, I was able to financially keep going.”
A lot of hard fights followed, with some of the best strikers in the world. “The entire time I knew, I was just gaining that experience. I knew I was going to come back to MMA, and the UFC is where I wanted to be.”
Watch the full UFC Vegas 12 post-fight press conference with Dustin Jacoby above.
