{"id":106409,"date":"2026-02-05T22:53:18","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T22:53:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/106409\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T22:53:18","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T22:53:18","slug":"the-yd-baker-story-douglas-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/106409\/","title":{"rendered":"The YD Baker story \u2013 Douglas Now"},"content":{"rendered":"

YD Baker, now 28 years old, used to be a football player. The sport was everything to him and he planned to ride it as far as it would take him. He went from Coffee High School to Scranton, Pennsylvania, then to Valdosta. It was a fast, violent ride.<\/p>\n

\"Walker<\/a><\/p>\n

And it ended as ferociously as it began. One day, YD found himself looking in the mirror not knowing what he would do or where he would go.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s where his journey really begins.<\/p>\n

\"AJAK<\/a><\/p>\n

But before we get there, let\u2019s take a little closer look at his football career. YD graduated from Coffee High in 2017. A two-way player as a sophomore and junior, YD rushed for 209 yards on 45 carries. He also caught two passes for 27 yards and a touchdown as a junior.<\/p>\n

Defense, however, is where he really made a name for himself. In three years of varsity action in the secondary, he played in 29 games, totaled 93 tackles (52 solo, 41 assisted), and six tackles for loss. He also had three sacks, one hurry, two interceptions, two passes defensed, and a forced fumble.<\/p>\n

It was good enough to earn him a spot at Lackawanna College in Scranton, Pennsylvania. But Scranton is a long way from home and things didn\u2019t go well. YD came back to Georgia and enrolled at Valdosta State University, where he planned to continue his playing career.<\/p>\n

But that fizzled out, too. Just a few short years after graduating from Coffee High, he had been to the mid-Atlantic and back and had very little to show for it. \u201cI thought I was going to be able to play at Valdosta State. It just didn\u2019t work out and I was out of football,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

YD thought law enforcement might be a good next step so got a job at the Coffee County Sheriff\u2019s Office. He began in the jail, which is where just about everyone starts out. That didn\u2019t work out, either.<\/p>\n

His next stop was at a car lot selling cars. It wasn\u2019t what he really wanted to do but the car business was good to him. YD sold cars for five years and made good money. He was smart with his finances and was putting money away. He had a plan. And selling cars wasn\u2019t it. \u201cI was saving money, trying to do the right thing. I wanted something more. I always had something else in mind,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

YD wanted to own his own business. He was tired of working for someone else. He wanted to be in charge of his success or his failure. It was risky but YD was driven, determined, and focused.<\/p>\n

He decided to try his hand in the restaurant business. Of all places, YD ended up in Sylvania, just about the last stop on Highway 301 before you get to South Carolina. He opened a Stoner\u2019s Pizza franchise and poured everything he had into it. The Sylvania community responded and the restaurant did well.<\/p>\n

Sylvania is nice. And they\u2019ve been good to YD and his family. But Sylvania isn\u2019t home and he wanted to get closer to Douglas. He applied for and landed another Stoner\u2019s franchise, this one in Waycross at 2505 Plant Avenue. Tuesday morning, he celebrated the grand opening of his second restaurant. The youngest owner in his franchise group, YD would like to establish Stoner\u2019s throughout South Georgia. \u201cThis has been a good run so far. I\u2019m excited about what the future holds,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

YD is married to the former Kaci Adams of Douglas. Together, they have two children, a five-year-old son named Jayceon and a one-year-old little girl named Kai. Coffee County is never far away from the Baker family; when YD isn\u2019t tending to his restaurants in Sylvania or Waycross, you can find him in Bridgetown riding his buggy or spending time with his family.<\/p>\n

\"Kevin<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"YD Baker, now 28 years old, used to be a football player. The sport was everything to him…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":106410,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[178,180,179],"class_list":["post-106409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}