Taye Diggs Leaves All American
posted by Kinaya Gibson | February 20, 2023 | In Arts and CultureOn February 13, it was announced that actor Taye Diggs would depart the hit CW show, All American. After that announcement, Diggs’s character Coach Billy Baker departed the show in a way that left fans speechless.
According to BET, Diggs stated that: “It was just a feeling that I got, and I just honored that feeling.”
Nkechi Okoro Carroll, All American’s showrunner, and Diggs both decided that the death of Billy Baker would be the best way for him to leave the show.
The exit came during episode 11 of season 5, where the Crenshaw High School football team would be spending a day at a football recruitment combine. On the way back from the event the school bus that was transporting the team including Coach Baker would suddenly lose air in one of its tires causing the bus to crash on its side slightly off of a cliff, which resulted in Coach Baker’s death.
Coach Baker represented a true father-figure to many of the shows characters, especially the main character Spencer James, who has now lost both of his father-figures in the show.
This is the second father the All American Universe has killed off in the past two weeks. In the spin-off show, All American: Homecoming, the male lead Damon Sims’s adopted father, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease, passed away. Both deaths have left fans in shock and wondering what’s next for the franchise.
The funeral episode for Coach Baker will premiere on February 20 on cable and on February 21 on the CW App for fans to say one last goodbye to Coach Baker and Diggs.
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