Baker gets 7 weeks!!

[Macca19]

Baker recieves a 7 week suspension (with 22 points carrying over) for his unseen 'hit' on everyones favourite Docker.

Crazy amount of weeks considering there is no evidence and no umpires saw it happen.

[NFC]

Staggering stuff. 7 weeks for an incident basically no one saw. Wow.

[Dirko]

Did Voss submit evidence ? That is a lot of games !! Did Farmer do a Burton and dob him in ?

[saintal]

what bullsh*t

not happy

[saintal]

:shock:

Did Voss submit evidence ? That is a lot of games !! Did Farmer do a Burton and dob him in ?

Farmer claimed to not remember anything from the incident. Not sure what part Voss played in all this.

[Macca19]

:shock:

Did Voss submit evidence ? That is a lot of games !! Did Farmer do a Burton and dob him in ?

Baker said that he tried to block him from running into the 50...that he was running in front of him, stopped, and Farmer ran into the back of him. Ricky Nixon said the same thing.

Farmer said he was standing watching the play when he felt contact to the side of the face and then was on all fours* His version is backed up by a Freo trainer who said Baker ran in from a diagonal direction but couldnt see the point of impact.

Tribunal gave him 425 points (4 games)...plus he had 1 game carrying over and the 40% loading for poor record meant it jumped up over 700 points meaning 7 matches.

I reckon we might hear more from this. Its the biggest suspension I can remember in a long time. I think Alaistair Lynch got 9 for his pathetic Grand Final perforamnce in 04 but that didnt mean anything as he had retired. Even Pickett only got 6 for his hit on Begley.

[sydney-dog]

7 weeks

about time....

i have watched the saints on 2 or 3 occassions live this year, Baker has been lucky on a few occassions, this time he pushed the boundary too far

who says you need a witness FFS.

in a court of law, do you need a witness to be convicted of a crime, the answer is no, their is other evidence that can be consider outside of witnesses and footage

I am not a fan of Farmer, but he was carried off with blood pouring from his nose, he is also likely to miss this week with concussion.... this occured outside of the play, what other explanation is their

what do people expect, we need to see footage to find someone guilty, we need a witness, well sometimes it is pretty obvious without the need to present this evidence

take a look at the guys tribunal history

7 weeks, about time to a thug who never makes the footy his first priority, and is always on the look out for a cheap shot

[Hasbeen]

Didn't Johnson from Collingwood get 8 weeks last night

[heater31]

Didn't Johnson from Collingwood get 8 weeks last night

He accepted 6 for an early plea this arvo

[Brad]

Sam Lienert
August 21, 2007 ST KILDA tagger Steven Baker was suspended for seven matches for rough conduct which left a player concussed and bleeding.

Baker was found guilty of engaging in rough conduct against Fremantle's Jeff Farmer during the third quarter of Saturday's match at Telstra Dome.

The tribunal jury accepted Baker's account of events, with the player saying he was running in front of Farmer, before stopping and propping causing Farmer to run into the back of him.

But it still found he had engaged in rough conduct, acting recklessly and that he made high contact to Farmer with high impact.

The incident, which was not captured on television footage, was referred to the tribunal after an investigation by AFL investigations officer Graeme McDonald.

The investigation was instigated after Farmer was left concussed and bloodied by the collision.

Baker's previous poor record at the tribunal increased the severity of his penalty, without which he would have received a four match ban.

But he received a 40 per cent loading for previous suspensions totalling four matches in the past two seasons, as well as 127.5 demerit points carried over.

The penalty will end Baker's season regardless of whether the Saints make it to the grand final and will extend into next season.

Saints football operations manager Ken Sheldon said the club will consider an appeal, and it will make up its mind by Wednesday's midday deadline.

Sheldon said the Saints were disappointed by Baker's ban.

"We're disappointed and we'll consider our next move over the evening and we'll make our choice on an appeal by 12 o'clock tomorrow, that's all I've really got to say," Sheldon said.

Farmer, who gave evidence from Perth via telephone, gave a version of events which conflicted with Baker's.

Farmer said he had been stationary or only walking slowly, and he had not seen Baker before he made contact to Farmer's face.

Baker said both players were running and he was in front of Farmer, before he stopped in order to make contact and block Farmer's run into the forward line.

Crucially, Baker admitted under cross-examination from tribunal counsel Andrew Tinney that even on his own version of events he initiated the contact which had caused Farmer to sustain concussion and a broken nose.

"You on your own account gave him no chance of avoiding coming into contact with you?" Tinney asked, to which Baker replied: "That's right."

Farmer's version was supported by Fremantle trainer Barry Kirkwood, while Baker's was backed by high profile player manager Ricky Nixon, who was a surprise witness tonight.

Nixon, a former Saints player who also manages many of the club's players, although not Baker, told the tribunal he had been watching the match from his corporate box on level two of the Telstra Dome stand.

He said he had been focusing on one of the players under his management, St Kilda's Sam Gilbert, and had seen the incident as it was in the line of vision between himself and Gilbert.

Nixon said he rang the Saints this morning after learning that Baker had been charged through hearing about it on the radio.

He said he did not contact investigators earlier as he had not known of the charge and did not suspect there would be one as he thought the incident "looked pretty straightforward".

The hearing took about three-and-a-half hours in total, with a two-and-a-half hour initial hearing, before the jury took about 25 minutes to find Baker guilty, then another shorter hearing before it decided on the penalty.

[BPBRB]

The bottom line is if you king hit a player way behind play then you can't expect not to face some charges. I suspect that if there were TV cameras then no-one would be getting upset and defending Baker becasue it would have been caught on video but maybe Baker knew there were no end cameras and took his chances. Regardless of who the vicitm was he still ended up getting flattened and clearly by suprise.

If one thing comes out of this and with all the money the AFL rapes from TV networks, then they need to ensure that either they or the networks supply enough cameras to capture images across the whole ground to avoid the "unknown" factors in incidents like this!

[Psyber]

7 weeks

about time....
i have watched the saints on 2 or 3 occassions live this year, Baker has been lucky on a few occassions, this time he pushed the boundary too far

who says you need a witness FFS.

in a court of law, do you need a witness to be convicted of a crime, the answer is no, their is other evidence that can be consider outside of witnesses and footage

I am not a fan of Farmer, but he was carried off with blood pouring from his nose, he is also likely to miss this week with concussion.... this occured outside of the play, what other explanation is their

what do people expect, we need to see footage to find someone guilty, we need a witness, well sometimes it is pretty obvious without the need to present this evidence

take a look at the guys tribunal history

7 weeks, about time to a thug who never makes the footy his first priority, and is always on the look out for a cheap shot

I strongly agree!

[Mop Up]

Yeh and don't we all hate how the guy waddles with his ass out.... Get some skills! Only gets a game because he can scrag and hit people. About time i say

[the wonder elephant]

sounds like your style mopup ??? all be it only on sundays !!

[devilsadvocate]

TWE and Mop Up, don't you rekon that cockhead from Mt Barker - ********- is like a bigger version of Baker?

Both walk like they've got a monster carrot jammed right in the kaiber.


Edited by Booney

[Booney]

Look at the taggers around the place.Ling,Cornes,Kirk,Shirley,none of them are as brutal as this little sniper.

Give 'im life I say!

[Rik E Boy]

7 weeks

about time....

i have watched the saints on 2 or 3 occassions live this year, Baker has been lucky on a few occassions, this time he pushed the boundary too far

who says you need a witness FFS.

in a court of law, do you need a witness to be convicted of a crime, the answer is no, their is other evidence that can be consider outside of witnesses and footage

I am not a fan of Farmer, but he was carried off with blood pouring from his nose, he is also likely to miss this week with concussion.... this occured outside of the play, what other explanation is their

what do people expect, we need to see footage to find someone guilty, we need a witness, well sometimes it is pretty obvious without the need to present this evidence

take a look at the guys tribunal history

7 weeks, about time to a thug who never makes the footy his first priority, and is always on the look out for a cheap shot

So nobody saw it except a Freo official, there's no footage, the umpire didn't see it but because you hate Steven Baker then that's a fair cop? Cripes I hope I don't ever get you on a jury if my a55 is on the line. Baker is a maggot, that much is true but this decision is bull5hit plain and simple and sets a poor precedent. The MRP has outdone itself in stupidity this season.

regards,

REB

[Rik E Boy]

LMAO. Who said it was a king hit? Not Jeff Farmer according to all reports...either that or he's 'doing a Browny' but of course all of you blokes saw everything. Nope, I'd be spewing if it was one of the Catters. We don't know 5hit except we hate Baker, end of story.

regards,

REB

[The Girth]

yep take ya licks ya dirty little turd its bout time

[JK]

So can we get rid of "Trial By Video" now?