Is Jake Shields UFC-Bound Whether He Wins or Loses on Saturday Night?

Many people believe that Jake Shields is going to earn himself a welterweight title shot against Georges St. Pierre in the UFC if Shields can defeat Dan Henderson this weekend.

I hate to burst the hopes and dreams of the fans once again, but that speculation has been heavily overstated.

While it's true that Shields is on the last fight of his contract, there is a clause in Shields' contract that gives Strikeforce an option on an additional fight.

Because of that, if Shields is victorious over Henderson, he'll almost certainly be required to fight at least one more additional fight in the organization, although he may be offered a new contract as well.

Apparently Scott Coker isn't quite as incompetent as some of his critics had imagined.

If Shields loses, it might be a good idea for Strikeforce to cut him.

When Shields fought against Jason Miller, the television ratings plummeted because the fight ended up being a grapple-fest that didn't really appeal to the casual fan.

Putting Shields on future Strikeforce cards might do them more harm than good.

That's why I think Shields has a better chance of winding up in the UFC if he loses his fight to Henderson.

Even if Shields loses to Henderson in an epic fashion, he's still got a bit of an excuse because Shields is really a natural welterweight.

Almost all of the best welterweights are in the UFC, and Shields won't fight his training partner Nick Diaz anyway, so Shields would have the most competition in the UFC's welterweight division, which could use some new blood anyway.

That being said, I can remember watching Shields fighting Paul Daley and thinking to myself that although he can take down Daley, I can't see a way that he could win against guys like Josh Koscheck or Thiago Alves, let alone St. Pierre. Those guys are just bad matchups for him.

Unfortunately for Shields, he doesn't have a fan-friendly style that could allow him to hang around as a perennial contender or gatekeeper, so although he's probably a top 10 fighter in both the middleweight and welterweight divisions, things are about to get very difficult for him.