Baked shadow and GI on non-static character?

I have a small character in my scene that has some very subtle animation on it but always stays on the same spot and doesn't move around the scene.
Because it doesn't move around, I'd like to include it in the baked lighting and have it contribute to the GI so it has a nice baked shadow underneath it (I don't care if the shadow doesn't change during runtime), but I can't mark it as static because of the animation on it.
What's the best strategy for handling a situation like this?

 

Tick Contribute GI and nothing else.

 

It only has a Skinned Mesh Renderer though which doesn't have the option to contribute to GI.

 

Okay seems best solution I can find is to put a sphere inside the character that does contribute to GI but doesn't render to camera.