Michael Bisping explains why he immediately jumped on the Georges St-Pierre offer when it was finalized.

As middleweight champion, Michael Bisping does have the upper hand in choosing whom he will be fighting next. So when the offer to fight Georges St-Pierre was finalized, he immediately said yes to it.

“The Count” did get a lot of heat, especially since many believe number-one contender Yoel Romero should be granted the next title shot. Even UFC president Dana White felt Romero “absolutely deserves” the next crack at the belt, after the Cuban fighter’s performance at UFC 205 against Chris Weidman.

But for Bisping, the opportunity to face St-Pierre and the money that came along with it was too good to pass up. After all, fighting for him is a means to provide for his family, more than anything else.

“As a fighter, we do this to get paid, we do it to earn money,” Bisping wrote at Champions.co. “We risk our health—our lives even—every time we step into the Octagon. We don’t do it to look cool—well, most of us don’t—we do it to provide for our families. That’s what I’m doing and that’s why I got started in this sport all those years ago. It was to provide for my family.”

Bisping also feels that if his fellow middleweights were offered to fight St-Pierre, they would also be saying yes, right off the bat.

“I know that some of these whiners at 185 are going to be crying over this, but if they were offered a mega-fight with Georges St-Pierre, wouldn’t they take it? Of course they would.

“They can sit there and say no they wouldn’t, but I know that if Yoel or Jacare or Rockhold or any of those guys in the Top 10 were offered a fight with #GSP, they would take it in a heartbeat. Bearing that in mind, why would they—or anyone—expect me to do any different?”

No date has been set for the Bisping-St-Pierre fight, but the UFC is targeting for it to happen sometime during the second half of the year.