The Jacksonville Jaguars traded several premium picks to move up and draft two-way Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter this past April at No. 2 overall. When you do that, you’re generally expecting a player to start contributing right away. Unfortunately, that hasn’t really happened for the former Colorado star. But don’t worry, God’s got him.
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Hunter has been playing both ways—257 offensive snaps (62.8 percent) and 148 defensive snaps (38.9)—but he hasn’t been making much of an impact. Through six games, he’s got just two pass breakups defensively and a mere 20 catches for 197 yards on the offensive side.
The Jags are hoping to see him break out over the next few weeks, and with that in mind, Hunter decided to reinvent himself by getting himself baptized last Sunday morning.
Hunter looked extremely happy to be going through the religious transformation. And while it didn’t result in immediate improvements on the gridiron—he had just four catches for 15 yards in a 20-12 loss against the Seahawks—for Hunter, it was bigger than football. It was about becoming a “better man” in all facets.
“That’s a crazy question, why did I get baptized? It’s Sunday, it’s God’s day, and I’ve been planning to get baptized for a minute. I want to change my life over become a better man. What does it mean to you? It means a lot, becoming a better man, leaving my old flesh and just becoming the new Travis,” he said about the experience.
It’s pretty heartening and encouraging to hear a young, rich, and famous athlete speaking that way about his faith and his priorities in life. However, as they tend to do, NFL pundits found a way to spin this negatively. It’s similar to when Vince Carter got criticized for literally attending his own college graduation before an NBA playoff game.
Skip Bayless and Ryan Clark butt heads over Hunter baptism
Faith and education are important pillars that are too often thrown to the side in favour of shorter-term goals. And yet, Skip Bayless believes that Hunter getting baptized the morning of a game showed that he’d “mentally checked out” and was “losing interest” in playing for the Jags. It was somewhat surprising considering Bayless’ staunch support of Hunter’s former Colorado teammate, Shedeur Sanders.
“These are not normal circumstances for Travis Hunter, the football player. The Jaguars are using him so little, especially on defense, where he is the most gifted — all-time gifted — that Travis Hunter is starting to lose interest. He’s starting to check out mentally on the Jags,” Bayless said.
“He was actually happy to be baptized on a gameday morning because football isn’t taking that much concentration or focus or pregame mental prep. No, not now. Now I’m certainly not suggesting that getting baptized was any kind of protest on Travis’ part. It was just a stunning indication of where his head is at or not at right now. It’s not really into football right now,” added the analyst.
Now, to be clear, Bayless was merely criticizing the timing of the baptism. He celebrated Hunter for deciding to get baptized (Bayless was baptized as a child) and also praised Hunter’s defensive abilities, saying he has the potential to be the “second-best cornerback who ever played pro football” behind his mentor Deion Sanders.
However, the lion’s share of Bayless’ half-hour rant was mostly criticism of Hunter, and another pundit, Ryan Clark, came to the youngster’s defense.
“Travis Hunter just wants to play ball. The young man doesn’t drink, party, or do any dumb sh*t. You still got folks finding reasons to be mad about things like baptism. Those same people loved Tim Tebow and admonished anyone criticizing him as someone who abhorred his outward love for Christ,” Clark said in a video posted on Instagram.
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Travis Hunter will have his best chance to break out this week in a London game against the Los Angeles Rams. Top Jaguars TE target Brenton Strange is on IR, and WR1 Brian Thomas Jr. continues to underperform. Most importantly, coach Liam Coen said publicly this week that they need to call more plays designed to get Hunter involved.
God didn’t take long to start providing for Travis Hunter after that baptism, eh?
