Michael Bisping Says He Won’t Fight Yoel Romero if He Beats Chris Weidman at UFC 205

Since winning the UFC middleweight title with a June decimation of Luke Rockhold, Michael Bisping has received plenty of flack for his alleged tendency to pick and choose his opponents.

Instead of taking on a legitimate contender in his first defense, the Brit took on a 46-year-old Dan Henderson in an effort to avenge an ugly 2009 knockout loss. Once this title defense was in the books, Bisping set his sights on title fights with Georges St-Pierre, a welterweight who has not fought in several years, and Nick Diaz, a welterweight riding a similar layoff who has not won a fight since 2o11. The champ then found himself on the receiving end of some serious fan backlash when he refused to fight top middleweight contender Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza in the same time frame. Though the champ has since done his best to justify his callouts of GSP and Diaz, and subsequent reluctance to fight Jacare, many fans are disappointed with his selectiveness in terms of possible opponents.

Unfortunately for those fans, the champ’s selectiveness appears to be far from over. In a recent episode of his podcast, The Countdown with Michael Bisping & Luis J Gomez, Bisping touched on UFC 205’s massive Chris Weidman vs. Yoel Romero middleweight bout. Logic suggests that the winner of this bout will be his next title challenger. Yet while Bisping admitted he’d happily fight a victorious Weidman, he also claimed that he’d probably turn down a fight with Romero, on the basis of the Cuban’s early 2016 brush with USADA. It’s worth noting that this USADA issue was ultimately deemed to be the result of a tainted supplement, not legitimate steroid abuse.

Bisping’s words:

“If Yoel beats Chris, I honestly don’t think I’ll fight Yoel, because he tested positive for steroids,” he said. “I read an article recently that said that it takes years for the advantages of taking steroids to get out of your system. Just because you don’t test positive anymore doesn’t mean you’ll lose all the extra muscle and stuff like that that you were able to achieve. So I think he needs longer, I really do, and I don’t see why he should be rewarded. If Weidman wins, that’s the fight I want. Me and Weidman, for a little while now, I’d say probably the last year, have gone back and forth, back and forth, talking sh*t, and yeah, it’s a fight that interests me, 100%.”

What do you think of Bisping’s attempts to pick and choose his opponents? Sound off, PENN Nation!