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2024 Gopherhole HAM of the Year
Hello Gopherhole and Merry Christmas! Another year of Gopher football is wrapping up which means it is time to welcome you all to the annual Gopherhole HAM* of the year award. For those that are new, this is a college football focused spoof of the Turkey of Year which is released in the Thanksgiving Day edition of the Star Tribune. If you want to look back to last year's HAM post you can find it here. Across the nation, it was one of the most exciting seasons in recent memory. Conference realignment brought many exciting matchups between teams that would normally not play against each other. The transfer portal gutted the depth of blue blood programs and brought some parity that was sorely needed in the sport. With all of the crazy upsets and near upsets that took place this year, it really felt like anyone could beat anyone (well… maybe not in the playoff so far). For our own program it was a roller coaster. The season was filled with exciting highs of beating USC, ending the “Big Bert” curse, and bringing the Axe back home. However, it was sprinkled with migraine-inducing lows of narrowly losing the home opener to North Carolina, the Pig heading back to the sewer… I mean Iowa, and AK and KC getting their revenge. On both the national and local levels, it was a fun season, but a HAM must be awarded. Without further ado, here are the finalists for this lowly award. *HAM stands for “having a migraine” because when I wrote this post I had a migraine thinking of all of the mind numbing events that took place this college football season.
Florida State-
Since being left out of the playoffs in 2023, the Florida State Seminoles have won a grand total of two games, one of which was a win against a 1-11 FCS school. Did Mike Norvell sell his soul for an undefeated 2023? Was it a genie wish gone bad? Is DJ Uneedtogetajob so bad that it rubs off on everyone else? Who knows and who really cares? Florida State fans were hoping that this season would make them forget about the massive migraine that was caused by being left out of last year's playoffs. Unfortunately for them the migraine only continued to get worse and worse. They were heavily considered to be the winner, but the committee just couldn’t bring itself to kick the horse while it’s down.
Offensive Line-
For the first time in what feels like forever, it was the offensive line that was the biggest weakness of the offense. In run blocking, the running game had one of its worst seasons in the last 15 years. The running game averaged a whooping 3.6 yards per carry, the worst number since the dreaded 2010 season. I know, that number doesn’t totally fall on the offensive line, they're not the ones carrying the rock. However, if you watched the games, you’d see the running backs having to dance with a defender in the back field more often than the offensive line providing holes to run through or getting much of a push. In pass protection, the O-line only gave up 25 sacks throughout the entire season, which isn’t too shabby. The problem is that 14 of those 25 sacks came in three back breaking losses (UNC, Michigan, and Rutgers). Watching the line play in those games had the committees’ heads spinning in pain from the migraine that was caused by watching them attempt to block people. The pain returns when you consider what this season could have been with just consistently average offensive line play. The unit did start to figure it out as the year went on. They had a particularly impressive performance against a highly touted Penn State defensive line. Much like the finalist below them, without that game, they may have found themselves as winners of this ghastly award.
Special Teams-
Everyone remembers the missed kicks that lost the home opener against North Carolina, it sticks out like a sore thumb in a season full of what ifs. What sticks out to me more is the blocked punt before the end of the first half that put Michigan goal to go. Michigan scored on the next play and went up by three scores. The Gophers would fight back, but ultimately lost the game by three. If that blocked punt doesn’t happen, maybe the Jug is back where it belongs. Couple these egregious mistakes with below special teams play as a whole and you get yourself on the finalist list for being HAM of the year. The special teams unit may have won if it wasn’t for their performance in the Penn State game. That blocked punt and extra point return acts like Tylenol the way it alleviates some of the migraine pain that came from this unit this season.
Gopherholers-
This one is for all of us. Anyone that has ever dared to come on this message board after a game knows just how many mind numbing, migraine inducing posts and conversations there are. This may be a permanent finalist spot.
The SEC-
A strong contender to win this dreadful award. The outcry that came from SEC country as SMU took the last playoff spot was insufferable, but understandable as most fans would have a cow if their team just barely missed the playoff. What sunk the SEC so low to deserve a spot on this list was their fans, a large sports media company, and a certain head coach *cough* Lane Kiffen *cough*, reacted during the first three playoff games. Suddenly during those three games, Alabama, South Carolina, and Ole Miss were as talented as the 2019 LSU Tigers and would have EASILY beaten any team that had made the playoffs. Clearly the committee was wrong and just doesn’t respect SEC supremacy. That was the mentality, until Ohio State blew Tennessee out of the water and sent those moonshine drinking hillbillies back to their smoky mountains with their tails between their legs. The SEC and their fans fell silent after that beatdown. Here's some helpful advice to any SEC fans out there, you want to make the playoffs? Don’t lose multiple games to average teams. Simple as that.
2024 HAM of the Year Winner: De’Vondre Campbell
For this year's winner, we pulled from our bag of alumni, who in one moment did such a HAM move that it earned him the title. It was only three years ago when Campbell was the pride of Gopher football in the NFL. He was an inspirational story, coming from the JUCO ranks and working his way into becoming a Power 5 starting linebacker, a fourth round pick by the Atlanta Falcons, NFL starter, and eventually a 1st team all-pro selection. Just three short years later after that all-pro selection, Campbell would end his career in the most migraine inducing way possible; he simply refused to go in. Why did he do this? No one is 100% sure. The rumor is he did it because he was upset that he was replaced by star linebacker Dre Greenlaw now that he had recovered from his injury. When asked about it, his teammates and coaches have openly criticized him to the media, saying they had never seen anything like it before and that Campbell will never be a part of the team again. The 49ers front office pulled a fast one on Campbell. Rather than cut him, they suspended him for the final three games. This cost Campbell a decent amount of money and ensured that he would not be able to finish out the season on another team. In one night, De’Vondre Campbell lost the respect of everyone in the NFL, only a true HAM could pull off such a move. The decision not to play and the aftershocks that followed earned former Minnesota Gophers Linebacker De’Vondre Campbell the second ever HAM of the year award.
Thank you all for reading, I hope you had fun while you did, I also hope you have a blessed day with your loved ones
Past winners:
2023 - 10 Years of the Big Ten West
