Kansas City Chiefs sign Deandre Baker, release Chad Williams

The Chiefs have signed Deandre Baker and released Chad Williams on Thursday.

The Kansas City Chiefs made one long-rumored roster move official on Thursday by signing free agent cornerback Deandre Baker. In order to make room for him on the team’s practice squad, they jettisoned wide receiver Chad Williams.

Baker was set free by the New York Giants earlier this season after he’d already been placed on the Commissioner’s Exempt list by Roger Goodell. The Giants were responding to the charges and allegations that Baker had committed armed robbery at a private party in Miami, Florida. He was later exonerated of those charges and his accusers were in fact trying to extort him.

Still, the Giants had already released him and even denied his overtures to want to re-sign with the team, this despite having just spent a first-round draft pick on him the previous season.

The Chiefs and several other teams became interested and Baker decided on the Chiefs fairly quickly once he was cleared of all wrongdoing. From the outset, Terez A. Paylor of Yahoo! Sports reported that Baker would be a practice squad addition until he was ready both mentally and physically to step back onto the field in Steve Spagnuolo’s defense for the Chiefs.

Baker started 15 games last season for the Giants and was the first cornerback taken in the 2019 NFL Draft.

As for Williams, he signed with the Chiefs practice squad earlier this year as a receiver and return prospect who has also spent time with the Arizona Cardinals and Indianapolis Colts.