Just as the case of Giants’ CB Deandre Baker robbing people at a barbecue started to die down, the news of Baker reportedly paying off witnesses to stay quiet regarding the incident was released recently.
From the beginning, many people suspected Baker and fellow Seattle Seahawks CB Quinton Dunbar had paid off witnesses. This is because of the fact that the witnesses completely changed their stories of what occurred at the party suddenly. There’s little evidence of what was actually said, bit I highly doubt it’s made up. NFL players get into some stupid stuff, then use some cash and a little bit of fame to get them out of it. Seems logical.
It is believed the Giants will eventually cut Baker by many reporters within the Giants media. Well, I’m going to be going over what it really means if Baker gets cut. I think Baker will be cut, it’s just a matter of time.
This quote by Joe Judge should explain his thoughts on the situation, and why Baker should be dropped. “The only culture we’re going to have in that building, period, is a winning culture. So what that means is that everybody comes to work every day regardless of how they feel. It puts the team first, period. You come in and put the team first.” There are some real key words there. ‘Team first.’ Going out to parties and robbing innocent people then paying them to say you didn’t do it is not exactly putting your team first.
Now, let’s dive in to how the Giants will be affected if they end up cutting Baker.
To start, Baker had a very underrated second half of the season. Many fans automatically applied a bad rep to Baker after his porous play in the first half of the season. Well, these stats say otherwise for the second.
For the first 10 games of the season, (before the bye) Baker let up an atrocious 40 receptions on 58 targets. On those 40 receptions, Baker also allowed 662 yards. Meaning he allowed a rough 16.5 YPC. Also, 68% of the balls thrown Baker’s way turned out to be completions. Some of the poor play could be blamed on a bad fit in the defense of James Bettcher, and the fact that the College to NFL CB transition is considered to be among the toughest.
After the bye, Baker played 6 games, so comparing the stats would be unbalanced, so I averaged the stats from those games and simulated the other four. Baker came out with 30 receptions on 60 targets, and 330 yards off of those receptions giving about 11 YPC. Baker came out a 50/50. 50% of the balls thrown Baker’s way were completions, and the other 50% were incompletions.
Baker’s loss could be pretty significant to the Giants secondary as he was the only corner outside of James Bradberry that actually had a decent amount of starts under his belt. Baker also showed improvement according to the stats above, and many considered him a breakout candidate. It’s too bad, because if Judge follows through with his ‘winning culture’ mantra, Baker should be a goner.
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