CJ Ham seeks to carve out a role in new Vikings offense

DULUTH, MN. (KBJR) - With six full seasons on the Vikings active roster, Duluth’s own CJ Ham is facing a unique situation heading into year seven.

Minnesota has transitioned into an all-new coaching staff and front office, which doesn’t have a reputation for utilizing the fullback position.

“There are less fullbacks than there were a handful of years ago but there are still so many teams that do employ it and of those teams that do they are very successful and like I said earlier I’m just glad to have to opportunity to come out here and compete and still be a part of that slim group I guess,” said Ham.

Throughout his time in the NFL, CJ has displayed flashes of being a productive pass catcher out of the backfield, as well as a reliable pass protection option.

“I have kind of been doing a little bit of everything the whole time if it’s catching balls, if it’s lead blocking if it’s pass pro whatever it is they ask me to do I’m just going to go out there and try and get it done.”

With head coach Kevin O’Connell installing a new offense during training camp, those utility skills could be key to Ham’s future success within the organization. Ham is entering the season on the most lucrative contractual year of his career, with a salary cap hit of $3,450,000, according to Spotrac.com.

“I think CJ is going to have a lot of different roles for us, he knows that and the best part about CJ is he can do it all and it is one thing to physically do it all but he is probably right up there with a few of our other guys on the offensive side if you teach him something one time, he’s got it and he’s ready to go execute that so with that he is learning a lot of different phases of our offense,” said O’Connell.

“We can only have 11 players out there at one time but we can vary how we use our personnel kind of like what we talked about early this week, how that happens and how that comes to fruition will be determined by guys like CJ.”

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