Will the bout with Dan Henderson be Jake Shield's final with STRIKEFORCE?

On April 17th, Strikeforce Middleweight champion Jake Shields will defend his title against Dan Henderson in the main event on CBS.

Jake is on a hell of a roll, having not lost in over five years. And while he has wins over folks like Robbie Lawler and Nick Thompson as well as UFC fighters Paul Daley, Mike Pyle, Carlos Condit and Yushin Okami, this will certainly be the biggest challenge of his career. Dan is an Olympic level wrestler and has a right hand that Michael Bisping is likely still having nightmares about.

But there is one other thing that makes this fight even more interesting: It is the last on Jake's Strikeforce contract.

Jake to Graciemag.com:

I’m focused on winning a fight at a time. Now I’m focused on Dan Henderson for this fight and after that my contract with Strikeforce ends. I’ll talk with Strikeforce and the UFC to find out which one I will work for.

So while many feel that Dan will beat Jake, there is a very real chance that if he wins, he could walk away from Strikeforce as the reigning MW champion.

Even though he has been doing well at 185, his normal weight class is WW and the best WWs in the world are in the UFC. He has never been shy about wanting to face GSP and this would be a chance for him to not just come to the UFC, but do so in a very high profile fashion. You have to figure Dana, a person that loves battles and one-upping the opposition, would love to have a SF champion walk into the UFC.

That seems like a hell of a risk for Coker and co to take. I have not heard anything about them negotiating, so I am guessing that Jake and co are looking to roll the dice and see if he can pull off the win and become a high-profile free agent. Of course a loss would certainly remove much of his leverage. While the UFC still might have some interest, I don't think he would be quite as mouth-watering a prospect as he would be with the belt still around his weight.