Recruit Snapshot: Justin Baker
August 16th marked the first game of the 2024 football season for Your High School Sports, a match up between the two top rated teams in the state of Georgia. The Buford Wolves paid a visit to the Milton Eagles, in a game that Milton held on to win 13-10. Being the first game of the season, it seemed appropriate to start this season’s recruiting snapshots with one of the first players to join Tennessee’s 2025 recruiting class, Buford running back Justin Baker.
Baker is 5 feet 10 inches tall, and he weighs in at 210 pounds. While Baker isn’t the biggest back out there, size is hardly a concern. The lead tailback for the Wolves, who have an embarrassment of riches in their backfield, Baker runs much bigger than his size. He may only way 210, but every ounce of it is muscle. Baker runs with exceptional power and toughness, not for his size, but period. There is no hesitation to go into the middle of the line, to deliver contact, or to run through it. Thanks to that low center of gravity and how low Baker keeps his body while running, tackling him is like trying to stop a bowling ball shot out of a cannon. It can be done, but whoever stops him isn’t going to like it. While there are many facets to his game, that power and toughness seem to be the hallmarks of Baker’s game.
There are many areas to point out about Baker as a prospect. He has good speed, able to exploit cracks in a defense for big gains. He shows the ability to get to and turn the corner, even against excellent opposition. Baker is a good option as a receiver. His hands and feel for finding space on a screen or running more traditional routes makes him a versatile weapon. Baker is a back that can motion out of the backfield to the slot or even line up as a receiver at the next level to create a mismatch. Baker is able to press the hole, and make sharp, decisive cuts to get up field and get yardage. He feels his blockers well, follows the scheme, and gets north and south. All of these things are important, but it is the trust that Baker’s coaches have in him that may be most impressive.
Baker is the lead back for a Buford team that will play two other guys, Jordan Allen and Ethan Ervin, that will play FBS football next season. Allen and Ervin are committed to Louisville and Florida Atlantic respectively, and both played good games against a Milton team that also boasts a pair of Tennessee commits in Dylan Lewis and Tyler Redmond as well. However, it is Baker that gets the start, and Baker that is the tone setter for the offense. Baker’s ability to do it all, but especially to pound away between the tackles, to grind defenses down, and then to exploit them for big gains, is where Buford hangs their hat on offense. The Wolves are one of the most talent rich teams in the state of Georgia, which is saying something, and this staff built the offensive identity of their team around what Justin Baker does best. That says volumes about the kind of player and young man that Baker is on the field and in the locker room. That kind of trust is earned, not given, and Baker has clearly earned it.
Projecting Baker to the next level, he fits well into the mold Tennessee has for their backs under Josh Heupel. There are a great deal of similarities between Baker and current Vols running back Dylan Sampson. Sampson is expected to be the starter and feature back for Tennessee going into his Junior season, and his success is a reason to think Baker can thrive in the system as well. Baker is not quite as fast as Sampson was coming out of high school, however Baker is the more physical of the two. That physical edge, coupled with dangerous speed and good hands make Baker a versatile player with the talent to carve out a role in Tennessee’s running back room wherever one exists. His experience and success going against some of the best high school talent in the country consistently also means Baker should be well prepared to make an early impact once arriving in Knoxville.
Justin Baker earned the trust of the Buford staff. The Wolves run an offense that is molded by what Baker does best. Baker is the pattern for the identity of the Buford offense. Similarly, the Tennessee staff pursued and took Baker’s commitment early. Josh Heupel and the Tennessee staff have put together a class that looks set to contend for a top five spot nationally, and Justin Baker was one of the first pieces of it. That speaks to the trust that Tennessee’s staff has in Baker as a player and person as well. Baker and Buford are currently laser focused on trying to win a state championship, but everything appears to be in place for Baker to show early why the Volunteer staff viewed him as a foundational piece in the 2025 class.
