READ: Part 1 of Jeff Glover Uncovered: Going Deep With 'The Pipelayer'

When Jeff Glover was 16, Ricardo "Franjinha" Miller moved into the neighborhood just three houses down from where Glover's family lived in Santa Barbara, CA. By then, Franjinha was already one of the sport's top competitors and a brown belt world champion. He had moved to California to start his own academy, Paragon.

At that time, neighbors were actually neighborly. So, shortly after Franjinha and his family were settled, young Glover walked over and knocked on the door.

At this point in the interview, Glover jumped to his feet and began to narrate that day's event, which would become the turning point of his entire life. 

"He opens the door, and I'm like, 'Oh, shit!' Because Franjinha is a bad-looking mother f***er, you know, and he was in his prime and he was f***ing jacked. So he invites me in, like 'Oh, come in boy! Oh, you like jiu-jitsu?'" Glover said, in an impeccable impersonation of the world-famous Brazilian coach. 

"And I didn't know what the f*** he was saying. I was like, 'What?' And he puts in a tape, and it's the UFC, and Royce Gracie is just holding some dude by the hair and punching him in the face. He's like, 'Oh, you like?'"

And I was like, 'What the f*** did I get myself into? I'm in this guy's house… What is this shit?!' I didn't know what UFC was, I didn't know who Royce Gracie was. I had been watching pro wrestling, where this is what a punch looked like…

With little warning, Glover demonstrated a staged WWE-style punch, his fist coming wildly close to my face, before continuing with his story.

"And I'm seeing some dude get held and bam, bam, straight to the mouth," Glover said. "I had never seen that before. You know what I'm saying? So I'm kind of scared of this guy, but I'm totally intrigued. I was like, 'Whoa, that's kind of my thing. I kind of like that.'"

Franjinha presented Glover with an offer he couldn't refuse: come to class every day, help with privates classes, and he could train for free. 

He accepted.


Glover had finally found something that could redirect all of his uncontrolled energy in a positive way. Jiu-jitsu captivated his mind and tapped into the keen intellect and exceptional talent that had always been there but could have easily been wasted behind bars or elbow-deep in motor oil.

At the same time, he had also found the positive male role model and father figure that he had desperately needed in his life. 

Franjinha wasn't afraid to dole out some tough love. If Glover was out of line, there were consequences. Unlike before, when his mother or school authorities had tried, and failed, to tame his unruly behavior, this time the "feral animal" in Glover responded. 

His life became jiu-jitsu. He spent every day, all day, with Franjinha. He stopped going to high school, because Franjinha had morning classes. Glover felt he was getting a better education at Paragon than he had in all the time he had spent in the formal educational system.


By the time he was 18, Glover was a blue belt, already a national champion, and starting to make a name for himself as a jiu-jitsu phenom. At purple belt, he gave an incredible performance against Mike Fowler in a Grappler's Quest superfight. In his first year as a brown belt, Glover won the Pan American Championships. He was earning a reputation for his willingness to fight anyone, at any weight. 

He had also started seeking out new and different training partners, fueled by his unquenchable need for novelty. Five years into his training, he began making trips to Las Vegas every other month to train at Marc Laiman's academy, Cobra Kai. 

"So at that point, I've trained with every f***ing dude at Paragon, and we all know each other's games," Glover said. "It's great; it's beautiful. But some new fresh dudes that didn't know me and I didn't know them, it was very appealing."

Then Laiman offered him a job teaching at the academy. 

Again, Glover was faced with an opportunity he couldn't refuse. "I told Franjinha this. I was like, 'Yo, dawg, I love you, and I appreciate what you've done for me, and I'll always be with you, but I'm going to do a year with this guy out in Vegas.'" 

That was in 2006, just before his second Pan Ams at brown belt, where he submitted all four of his opponents to win the championship medal. 


It was there on the podium that Franjinha gave Glover his black belt. With tears in his eyes, Franjinha pulled his top student close.

And he whispered in my ear, he was like, 'Boy, go to Las Vegas. Go show them how we do this the Paragon way. It was such a warm goodbye, that it kept me coming back. I will always go back to Franjinha. And I still go back to him whenever I need guidance.

Part III coming tomorrow.

See match videos and more of Jeff Glover here