UFC 129: Will Jake Shields Move to Middleweight with Victory over GSP?

On April 30, 2011 at UFC 129, current Ultimate Fighting Championship welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre will face his toughest challenger yet in Jake Shields.

Shields, who is undefeated in his last 15 fights, is one of the best jiu-jitsu practitioners in Mixed Martial Arts today and has beaten top fighters such as Yushin Okami, Carlos Condit and Dan Henderson.

If Shields is able to pull off the upset in front of 55,000 screaming fans in the enemy territory of Toronto, it would create an entire list of challengers that would make some very interesting matchups.

A list that includes several of St-Pierre's previous victims, such as BJ Penn, Jon Fitch, Dan Hardy and Josh Koscheck, but also entirely new contenders in Anthony Johnson and Carlos Condit.

However, ESPN.com has reported Shields may consider moving to middleweight if he is victorious at the end of the month.

Shields has had past experience as a middleweight while in Strikeforce, where he held the promotion's middleweight championship and successfully defended it against Dan Henderson in his last fight before joining the UFC.

Shields is always looking to challenge himself and thinks a fight with Anderson Silva would be an intriguing one.

"I'm always looking for challenges, so I'm going to go where the challenge is. If I'm successful at 170 and take that belt, I'll probably start thinking about [it]. I'm in the sport to test myself," Shields said.

Shields would go on to say that moving up and down in weight can be aggravating but it is something that he will probably do in the future.

"If I start getting bored, I really wouldn't want to be here anymore," he said. "So yeah, I would definitely move up."

A potential fight between Jake Shields and Anderson Silva could have UFC Matchmaker Joe Silva licking his chops, but Shields is going to have to get through one of the most dominant champions in St-Pierre first.