Brandon Royval got an offer to face Kai Asakura at UFC 305 in Perth, but he ultimately turned it down.
Now, Royval will face Tatsuro Taira in the main event of Saturday’s UFC Vegas 98 fight card at the UFC APEX. “Raw Dawg” says the fight with the former RIZIN bantamweight champion excited him, but if he was going to make the 10,000-mile trek, it needed to be worth his while.
“They offered me that fight in Australia,” Royval told MMA Fighting. “I asked them for more money, I asked for a handful of stuff, and they said no. And then I asked them for one of any of those things, and they said no. And I was like, all right, well, then I’m not gonna go f*cking fight some dude, not in the UFC, for not much money, all the way across the [world] where I’m not getting any sleep. I’m not getting any of this, I’m not getting a guaranteed title shot, I’m not getting any more money.
“I got to bring my whole team out there if I’m going to go out there because I need to get my Arcadian rhythm in cycle. So it’s like I got to fly out my whole team and guys that look like Kai Asakura. So it was one of those [things where] financially [it] doesn’t make sense to me. And then it also, like, the risk doesn’t [exceed] the reward. If I go out there and lose, I just lost somebody without a ranking, and if I go out there and win, they’re not guaranteeing me a title shot or anything. So there was really no reward in that.”
The 32-year-old Royval is set to make his 10th octagon appearance, and does so in his second consecutive Fight Night headliner. In December Royval came up short in his first opportunity at UFC gold, losing a unanimous decision to Alexandre Pantoja at UFC 296. With his future unknown following the loss, Royval jumped on the opportunity to face past opponent Brandon Moreno on short notice in the main event of UFC Mexico City, and went on to get the victory via split decision.
With well over four years in the promotion, and being the UFC’s current top-ranked 125-pounder, Royval has learned, and understood, that when you’re in that position, the juice needs to be worth the squeeze — even for a fan-friendly fight against Asakura.
“Dude, I think of myself like, bro, I’m a prostitute for sure,” Royval explained. “I put my body on the line for money. But it’s at this point [that] I f*cking earned my No. 1 spot. I fought my ass off. I’m No. 1 in the world. So I’m an expensive prostitute. I’m not a cheap ass prostitute anymore. I’m not just selling my body to anybody who we’ll take it.
“I f*cking I got a price on me, and I’m not just f*cking anybody, you know what I’m saying? I still believe in my heart of hearts I’m the most exciting fighter in the flyweight division. Anytime my fights haven’t been exciting, It wasn’t because of me.”
Asakura signed with the UFC earlier this year following a stoppage win over former Bellator champ Juan Archuleta at RIZIN 45 this past New Year’s Eve. The 30-year-old has still yet to make his promotional debut.
Should he defeat Taira on Saturday, Royval would love to get his chance to avenge the loss to the champion. But if not, he would love to face Asakura, and maybe do so if the UFC returns to Japan in 2025.
“I don’t know, I really don’t know,” Royval said. “I want to fight for a belt. But that being said is like, if they’re not gonna give me a belt and it’s like, I think I have a win over the whole top five of the division, I don’t know what else you guys want, motherf*cker.
“But damn, yeah, I kinda wanna fight Kai Asakura in Japan. Japan is a dream. Kai Asakura is sick. That gets me out of bed, and I want to fight for a f*cking belt. If they want to hype Kai, then I want to take that.”
