Hampton grows into Troy starter

TROY — A nearly 6-foot-3, 215-pound Jamie Hampton walks around the Troy University weight room with a little more swagger now.
A year after coming from one of the smallest high schools in Alabama and gaining 25 pounds of muscle, Hampton is now the Trojans’ No. 1 quarterback.

He’s not afraid to scold a wide receiver for missing a route, nor is he shy any more about his physique.

“He’s doing things in the weight room that he’s never done before. You probably saw him doing pass skel with his shirt off,” offensive coordinator Neal Brown said. “As his body has grown, his confidence has grown.”

Hampton, who just turned 19 in May, came out of spring practice as the top quarterback, winning a four-man race with Levi Brown, Tanner Jones and Jonathan Chandler.
For leadership purposes, he was informed of his role a week after spring practice ended. He would be the one organizing pass skeleton drills this summer, drills that coaches aren’t allowed to watch.

“I’m having to run it instead of going out there and doing what (two-year starter Omar Haugabook) says,” Hampton said. “I’m the one that has to tell people what to do.”
Hampton threw the ball well in the spring, but what made him stand out from the others was his ability to make things happen with his feet — something coaches didn’t know he was good at until he broke a 56-yard run late against Arkansas in his first game.

“Me and (former offensive coordinator Tony Franklin) were like, ‘Whoa,’ on our headsets,” Brown said. “We thought he was an average runner in high school. We didn’t expect him to be dynamic running the ball here.

“Then, when he first got here, he didn’t throw the ball as well as we would have liked but ran it much better than we thought he could.”

Hampton put Cedar Bluff on his shoulders and led the high school to a state runner-up finish his senior year. He was headed to Purdue before a change of heart a month before Signing Day.
“I backed out because I knew in my heart that I wanted to go somewhere closer,” Hampton said. “I was praying because I didn’t want to go that far, saying ‘God, please give me a school in Alabama.’ All the sudden, I get the phone call two weeks later from Troy and it all fell into place.

“I don’t know if I should have (committed early), because it might have hurt me as far as recruiting, but I’m happy where I am. Troy is the best place for me.”

So the small-town kid from Cherokee County spurned the recognition of the Big 10. Purdue’s loss is appearing to be Troy’s gain.

“I went to a 1A high school and graduated with 33 people.,” Hampton said. “If you go to a school with 40 or however many thousand people Purdue has, it would be a lot more of an adjustment that if you come to a school like Troy.

“As far as academics, you have a good teacher-student ratio. It’s a better fit for me, because I’m a home-town country boy and I like the small towns more than the big towns, so I felt like it was a better fit here.”

But the shoes he has to fill are bigger than ones he ever saw in high school. Haugabook was a two-time Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Year and led the Trojans to 16 wins in two seasons and two Sun Belt co-championships.

“My job as a coach is to keep his confidence up,” Brown said. “Right now, his confidence is really high. You’ll see him get a lot better this year and I think he’s got a chance to be really good.
“Jamie’s a guy who’s not as fast as Omar. He’s got a stronger arm, but he hasn’t done it with the lights on. Jamie had a long run against Arkansas, a catch against Georgia and some runs against Western Kentucky.

“Right now, there is no comparison between the two.”