By ROBERT LINNEHAN
It’s safe to that 99 percent of us never fielded a phone call from Urban Meyer or Joe Paterno asking us to play football for their college programs. Most of us never played a game of high school football or baseball and looked up into the stands to see several scouts holding clipboards, watching our every move. Yes, we are in the majority, but what is it like to be in that glorified minority? What’s it’s like to be heavily recruited by some of the most recognizable college programs in the country?
For a Haddonfield alumnus and a Haddonfield junior, it’s a blast.
Jimmy Cashman, a Haddonfield junior, is one of the most heavily recruited football athletes to come out of the program in the past several years. The young offensive tackle has already received several scholarship offers from some seriously talented programs. Usually a week doesn’t go by when another coach or athletic director calls him with an offer.
John Walter has been there and done that. The 2009 graduate of Haddonfield Memorial High School is currently a starting pitcher for Penn State University, racking up a 4–3 start to the season with a 2.48 ERA, good for fifth in the Big East.
Walter remembered his recruitment fondly, as he recalled that it started his sophomore year when he was playing with Tri-State Arsenal, a travelling South Jersey baseball team.
“It was until I played in Arsenal that I got in front of coaches. It’s a club team, I had to try out and we were pretty good,” he said. “We traveled, took a trip to Florida, places like that. We won some national championships.”
One of his teammates, Mike Trout, was drafted 25th overall by the Anaheim Angels in the 2009 amateur draft, Walter said, so professional and college scouts were always coming to the games to watch him play. Several must have noticed Walter play, he said, because his junior year of HMHS he started to receive calls from universities to come for an official visit.
When a university offers you an “official” visit, Walter said it’s an all expenses paid trip to the university where they sell you on their program. He was offered several, but turned them all down
But it was just one university he was waiting to hear from, he said, and Penn State was it. Both of his parents attended Penn State and were athletes, he said, so it was his desire to follow in their footsteps.
“They would pitch me on the phone, tell me about their program, the facility. Both of my parents went to Penn State. I went to camps here when I was younger and was given a tour of our baseball field. It’s awesome it’s a brand new stadium. Penn State was an easy sell,” he said. “I was looking at a few other schools. Seton Hall offered me a visit. I took a few unofficial visits to Pepperdine and Columbia.”
He spoke with the coach, who told him to focus on his academics his senior year. That was all Walter needed to hear, as he signed an offer from the university in October of his senior year.
Cashman is currently living the life that Walter remembered fondly. The 6’7, 270-pound junior offensive lineman is pondering offers from such NCAA football powerhouses as Tulane, University of Connecticut, Villanova, University of Delaware, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, Duke, N.C. State, University of Miami, Harvard, Temple, and Bucknell have all made formal offers to Cashman.
Coaches have been coming to HMHS to meet with varsity football Head Coach Frank DeLano and to also meet informally with Cashman. Last week, Cashman said coaches from the University of Pittsburgh, Rutgers University, Stanford, and the University of Wisconsin all visited Haddonfield to speak with Cashman.
Coaches are allowed to call Cashman once a week until the end of May. Starting Sept. 1, Cashman can start taking official visits to schools and start fielding phone calls from head coaches.
“It’s flattering. Its been awesome. Its been real exciting recently, it seems like a ton of schools have started to offer,” he said. “Last year at this time I never really saw myself getting the chance to play for these giants schools. As the season ended, I saw that these division one schools came in to see me and I’m amazed. It’s awesome seeing them come in.”
It’s unbelievable to be going through this experience, Cashman said, and he plans to enjoy it until he makes his decision.
