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Strikeforce Champion Jake Shields To Be Assistant Coach On TUF 11
Strikeforce Middleweight Champion Jake Shields has agreed to be a part of Chuck Liddell’s coaching staff on the upcoming season of “The Ultimate Fighter.” The highly decorated fighter made the announcement in an email to his fan club members Wednesday evening. The show begins its six-week taping session soon, and will premier on Spike TV on March 31.
The grappling ace will be a part of Chuck Liddell’s coaching staff for season 11 of the hit reality television show. Shields credits Liddell for getting him interested in the sport; “Chuck asked me a couple weeks ago and I'm always willing to help him out. Chuck was the one who originally got me into MMA in the first place. I owe him a lot but besides that I'm excited to be part of TUF and hopefully I'm able to help Chucks team get the finals.”
Shields (24-4-1), a consensus top five welterweight, recently moved up to middleweight to capture the Strikeforce title this past November. In that bout he would win a lopsided decision over Jason “Mayhem” Miller, displaying a wide array of his Cesar Gracie black belt level jiu-jitsu. Among his twenty-four wins, Shields has victories over Robbie Lawler, Paul Daley, Nick Thompson, Carlos Condit, Yushin Okami, Dave Menne, Akira Kikuchi, and Hayato Sakurai.
“The Ultimate Fighter 11” will feature Liddell and his team of middleweights, facing off against “The Hunting Beach Bad Boy” Tito Ortiz and his team. This will be the second time around coaching for both fighters, and will likely lead to an epic third battle between the two legendary fighters.
Shields, himself, understands that while he is in Las Vegas training the next generation of middleweight champions, he too may end up training for an epic battle; “. I'm leaving San Francisco tomorrow morning and I'm headed to Vegas for six weeks to shoot the show, as well as train, just in case Strikeforce finalizes my next fight.” That next fight could come as early as April against former Pride champion Dan Henderson.
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