Aaron Hernandez was a New England Patriots tight end whose NFL career ended in 2013 after his arrest, and he was later convicted of murder before his death in 2017. Online, his name became shorthand for a career and reputation vanishing overnight. Short voice clips using the gone forever phrasing spread through meme pages and soundboards, detached from news coverage and reused as a dark punchline. It remains popular because the reference is instantly recognizable to sports fans while the wording works even in unrelated edits about anything ending permanently.