Adrian Yanez vows to put Vinicius Salvador “asleep” at UFC Vegas 92 in “do-or-die” fight for his career

Adrian Yanez believes he could be fighting for his job at UFC Vegas 92 on Saturday.

Yanez is coming off back-to-back stoppage losses to Jonathan Martinez and Rob Font and has fallen out of the rankings. It was a tough 2023 for Yanez as he went 0-2, but he says the blame is on himself as he got too comfortable and started to find shortcuts in his preparation.

“I got way too comfortable. For these past couple of years after my coach had passed, I was fully involved in film study and made sure I was involved, then I got too comfortable, and I wasn’t doing my due diligence,” Yanez said on Just Scrap Radio on BJPENN.com. “The best way to explain it was I was going to school, I was doing all the work in class, but the reason I had a failing grade was because I wasn’t doing the homework or studying. I wasn’t doing enough, I wasn’t film studying or preparing myself the way I should have.”

Once Yanez was ready to return, he thought he would get someone just outside the top 15. But, when he got the offer to face Vinicius Salvador at UFC Vegas he was surprised by it.

“This one came out of nowhere… I was thinking about Daniel Santos or John Castaneda because they are right outside the top-15 and I know if I beat one of those guys, I’m in line to get back into the mix. This one came, and I was in Vegas and my manager said they got me a fight on May 18. I said ‘Cool’ and went back into training. Then five minutes later I was like ‘Wait, who am I fighting.’ They told me Vinicius Salvador and I was like ‘Who the f**k is that?’ It took me a second because there is no Vinicius Salvador at bantamweight and saw he was coming up,” Yanez said.

Salvador is 0-2 in the UFC with both his fights at flyweight as he’s moving up to 135lbs for this bout against Yanez. Although Adrian Yanez is a sizeable favorite, he says he isn’t taking Salvador lightly at all as he knows his job could be on the line.

But, Yanez is confident in his striking ability that he will be able to KO Salvador and return to the win column in a big way.

“I need to have the mindset, I have to keep my place, you are not taking this shit from me. I want to f**k this guy up because I can’t let this guy be the guy, I have to put on a masterclass and prove I deserve to be there… This is do-or-die for me… The way I see it playing out, I feel like he will leave some openings and I will take advantage of them. I’ll put him asleep against the fence,” Yanez said.

Should Yanez get the knockout win, the goal is to get someone outside the rankings next time out and end the year back in the top 15 at bantamweight.

“I go out there and starch him, it doesn’t put me in the top 15, but if somehow the people who do the rankings want to put me in there, it is what it is. But, I don’t believe it puts me in the top 15, I think it puts me right outside the top 15 to fight a guy to put me in the top 15,” Adrian Yanez concluded.