Michael Bisping believes Georges St-Pierre will not defend the middleweight title if he ends up winning it at UFC 217.

For the first time in his career, Georges St-Pierre will be moving up in weight to fight for the UFC middleweight title. What is not commonly addressed, however, are his next plans if he does end up winning a second world title.

From a logical standpoint, St-Pierre should subsequently face interim champion Robert Whittaker to unify the titles. But for the current belt-holder Michael Bisping, GSP will likely push through with other plans of his own.

“He keeps talking about, ‘It’s in the contract. It’s in the contract that I fight Whittaker,’ but he ain’t,” Bisping said in a recent episode of his Believe You Me podcast (transcript via MMA Fighting). “He ain’t gonna fight Whittaker if it’s in the contract or not. I believe it is in the contract but all he’s gotta do is say, ‘I don’t fancy doing that and if you want me to fight again and maybe sell a lot of pay-per-views, it’s gotta be someone else.’ The UFC would fold, I’ve got to imagine.”

“He wants to beat me, go back down to welterweight, beat Tyron Woodley, and then face Conor McGregor, beat all three, and then retire and make a ton of money. And the UFC probably wants that to happen. By that I don’t mean beat Conor, I mean beat me. Beat me, then either beat Woodley or go straight to Conor.”

Based on this belief, Bisping feels he is now obliged to beat St-Pierre to prevent such a situation from happening.

“He doesn’t need to fight regularly,” Bisping said. “[St-Pierre can] fight sometime towards the end of next year and in the meantime, Conor can fight (Nate) Diaz or (Tony) Ferguson, whichever one it’s gonna be, and then he can take some time off, and in the meantime, St-Pierre can be losing the weight to meet at a catch-weight.”

“The skeptic inside me says [the UFC] probably want that to happen. If I was running the UFC, that’s what I’d want to happen. My job is to play spoiler, wreck all those plans, and beat the shit out of Georges St-Pierre.”

Bisping and St-Pierre will headline UFC 217 on November 4th at Madison Square Garden in New York City.