Arizona Cardinals safety Budda Baker was awarded the Art Rooney Sportsmanship Award.
From the team:
Arizona Cardinals safety Budda Baker has been named the winner of the 2025 Art Rooney Sportsmanship Award at tonight’s NFL Honors ceremony in San Francisco, CA.
The award is presented each year to an NFL player who best demonstrates the qualities of on-field sportsmanship, including fair play, respect for the game and opponents, and integrity in competition.
This marked the third straight year Baker was
a finalist for the award, which was created in honor of the late founding owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers and Pro Football Hall of Famer Art Rooney, Sr.
The winner of the NFL Sportsmanship Award is determined by a vote of current NFL players. This marks the second time a Cardinals player was named the Art Rooney Sportsmanship Award winner after wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald took home the honor in the award’s inaugural season in 2014.
As the winner, Baker received a $25,000 donation from the NFL Foundation to a charity of his choice.
As aggressive on the field as any player in the league, Baker has always balanced his relentless and physical playing style with a respect for the game and his opponents. Over the last five seasons (2021-25), Baker easily led all NFL DBs with 580 total tackles while adding 4.5 sacks, 26 tackles for loss, six interceptions, 24 passes defensed, two forced fumbles and two fumble recoveries. Despite that production and playing over 4,900 total snaps during that span, he was penalized just four times.
Baker has been voted a team captain each of the last six seasons and has also been selected him to the Pro Bowl eight times, including as a starter at safety each of the last seven years.
The other finalists in 2025 were LB Lavonte David (Tampa Bay), LB Demario Davis (New Orleans) and T Brian O’Neill (Minnesota) in the NFC, and DT DeForest Buckner (Indianapolis), DT Harrison Phillips (New York Jets), DT Zach Sieler (Miami) and LB Kyle Van Noy (Baltimore) in the AFC.
Congratulations to Baker on an outstanding award.
