Dallas “The Touchdown Maker” Baker played wide receiver for Ron Zook and Urban Meyer from 2002 to 2006. Dallas originally signed with Steve Spurrier in 2001, but he had to sit out a year due to academic qualification. He was named All-SEC after a career high of 60 catches for 920 yards and 10 touchdowns in 2006. Baker graduated with a degree in health and human performance in 2006, leaving ranked near the top of all 3 career lists with 151 catches (5th), 2,236 yards (6th), and 21 touchdowns (9th). The Pittsburgh Steelers picked him up in round 7 with pick #227 of the 2007 NFL Draft. He played sparingly in the NFL, CFL, and AFL before becoming a coach at Warner University in Lake Wales, Florida. Trivia: Dallas’ uncle is Gator Great Wes Chandler.
They LOVED him up in Canada, where there's only 3 downs and a long-bomb catch-everything on-the-run receiver is, like, the "go-to-guy" on 2nd and long (seems like it's almost ALWAYS basically the equivalent of what we down here think of as "3rd-and-fling-it" for offenses in that league).
Gods, I'd almost forgotten how it used to be with us, the procession of superb athletes in scary offenses (scary to the other team, that is)...Spurrier really got that goin' (well, gotta give some props to Charley Pell and Galen Hall before him, too, but they got us in so much deep doo doo with the NCAA--even tho' it WAS "S.O.P." at the time in the SEC, as elsewhere--that SS had to do it all starting from less-than-scratch with limited scholarships and fishbowl scrutiny)...anyway, once we also started building better and better defenses after Spurrier left, well, those are the "Golden Years" now. The shock/joke of 'em all is that in retrospect after LAST season, even the short Zook Era doesn't track THAT badly in comparison: it had its great and exciting moments (I've been watching some of the old games--most of 'em are avail on YouTube) and wasn't near the life-sucking hope-sinkhole that the last few years' slide has turned out to be--and we were not so far gone at the end of that time that Meyer couldn't basically reload and GO within a season when he got here. It should give us some hope now, and yet I, like most, DON'T expect any SUDDEN resurgence. Cupboard seems bare (at least relative to the competition, in our state AND in our Conference). With good recruiting and the Coach & staff we've got now, we MIGHT be back in that "just give us a year" position by NEXT season, with lots of excitement and swings of emotion, highs and lows along the way. At least it's stopped being this plodding, frustrating BORE our play (and everything else) had descended to. Again, I really liked Muschamp, the man, but he just never seemed to "get" Florida, the SEC, OR the whole idea of thrill and passion every Saturday. Maybe it was just stubbornness, a kind of "I know I'm right and they'll love it when we win"--some truth there, sure, but there's a whole lot more that's made UF football great, along with the winning. These "archaeological expeditions" on E-'s part helps to refocus that. For me, it's like I just woke up out of a gray dream I couldn't get out of, like I was doing nothing but digging a trench in the hot sun all night--and now I wake up exhausted and listless. Think we all NEED a bucket'o'cold water and a storm of hope and excitement to WAKE US UP.
(Btw, even SS eventually learned the value of D and a kicker, it would seem--after leaving us, at (the real) USC...yeah yeah, I know--I did my grad work at "the one in the west", I KNOW how they and most outside the South see it...screw 'em all.)
