School: Upper Moreland
Lacrosse
Favorite athlete: Chase Utley
Favorite team: Philadelphia Eagles
Favorite memory competing in sports: "Junior year we had a game vs. Norristown and we were down pretty much the whole game. We had a fourth-quarter comeback, tied the game and sent it to overtime with a couple seconds left, and then we ended up winning in overtime."
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: "Before I decided that wearing a cup was a good idea in lacrosse, I think in a game against Cheltenham, I was chasing after somebody scooping up a ground ball, and I kind of intercepted a pass with where the cup should be. I was on the ground, the game stopped, it was pretty embarrassing. Ever since then, I wear a cup every day."
Music on iPod: "Pretty much everything ... Li'l Wayne, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sublime, Kid Cudi"
Future plans: "I want to become a personal financial advisor. I'm majoring in economics and finance at Penn State because I want to do that. And I'd probably want to move to Hawaii or somewhere warm, by the beach."
Words to live by: "Life is too short, so love the one you got." (From ‘What I Got’ by Sublime)
One goal before turning 30: "To own a house."
One thing people don’t know about me: "I grew up with a single parent since fourth grade. I've lived with my mom my whole life."
Jim Cramer is the first to admit that -- at 5-foot-7 -- he's not the biggest guy out on the lacrosse field. Nor the most skilled.
But when it comes to leadership, there are few who stand taller than the Upper Moreland senior has.
The Golden Bears may have struggled through an 0-14 American Conference season in Cramer's senior campaign, but his contributions as a leader have not gone unnoticed by teammates and coaches.
"This was the first year we had the team elect captains," said Upper Moreland coach Jared Mayes. "Jim was right up there as far as being recognized by his teammates. He's not necessarily our best player, but he's a real vocal kind of a leader.
“He understands the things we're trying to do and he's trying to lead that way. He's one of the smarter guys I've ever coached. He really does understand the things that you're trying to do. He's always helping direct. He gets everybody going in the same direction, he's poised enough to get everybody to relax and understand what we want to do."
But while some of his teammates have been playing the game since middle school or earlier, Cramer was more of a latecomer to the sport. His introduction came in his sophomore year when he attended a lacrosse meeting prior to the season.
And he quickly fell in love with the game.
"It looked like a fun sport," said Cramer, who also participated in winter track that year. "The program was new [in its second year as a varsity sport] and they're always looking for new kids. I tried it and I loved learning a new sport.
"We had a lot of good seniors my sophomore year. They taught me a lot. They taught me how to lead the team. After they left, there were not a lot of team leaders. I just tried to step up as a leader because I knew we were going to need it. I just wanted to keep everybody working hard and try to set an example."
That first season, Cramer immersed himself in lacrosse, getting as much exposure -- and practice -- as he possibly could.
"There was a clinic going on that I had some information on," Mayes said. "He was the only one from our group that went to that. He had no equipment -- we lent him a full set of equipment from the school, and he took the time and the effort and money to go to the clinic, to literally find out about the sport hands-on."
"My sophomore year, the seniors would pull me aside, tell me what I'm doing wrong," Cramer said. "But I had to do a lot of working on my own, throwing the ball off the wall and learning the game. After you pick it up, it just becomes second nature."
And as Cramer worked to improve his skills, he also learned that lacrosse was a sport that relied primarily on two things in which he excelled -- brains and heart.
"The hardest thing to pick up was understanding what to do with the ball, how to protect the ball, all the different rules," he said. "I always use my head when I'm out there, trying to figure out what's going to happen next. It's a thinking game for me, that's always how sports has been, just guessing what's someone's going to do.
"Something like running after a ground ball ... there's skill involved, but when it comes down to it, it's who wants the ball the most. That's what I love about it. It's all hustle and who wants it more."
His intelligence and heart have helped shape him into a perfect captain for such a trying season. Despite games against exponentially larger schools with more established programs, the outcome can occasionally be a foregone conclusion before the first draw.
But that doesn't mean Cramer won't give everything he's got on the field. And he expects the same from his teammates.
"It's tough when we're in a practice or in a huddle facing a tough game," Mayes said. "There are games where everybody knows how the game's going to go, but you can still find positives, you can still have a good performance even though you're outmatched.
“Jim was that guy. He would help set the tone, give those quick little messages that even if the team loses, it doesn't mean we still can't pass and catch and go after ground balls and hustle. He not only realized that was what was required of him, but he was able to do it."
It's a model he's been able to utilize in the classroom as well.
Recently recognized as an Academic All-American, Cramer will be graduating in the top 10 of his class of 241 students at Upper Moreland. He is vice president of the school's Key Club service organization and a People To People member, where, among other duties, he serves as an ambassador to foreign exchange students, and also spent three weeks in England and France in the summer of 2008.
"I'd never been out of the country before," he said of the cross-Atlantic trip. "I had the time of my life there. And the Key Club, I have a fun time there. We do things like running blood drives and stuff like that. It's not really something I look at as a sacrifice. People are like, 'You're sacrificing your time,' but I enjoy doing it. It's a fun time."
In the fall, Cramer will head to Penn State University. Though he won't be playing lacrosse there (aside from possibly playing on a club team), he's already looking to continue his impressive achievements as a scholar and leader.
Cramer plans to pursue a double major of finance and economics, and he's been accepted into the prestigious Sapphire Leadership Program at Penn State's Smeal College of Business.
Mayes has no doubt that Cramer will continue to impress as he continues through life. And he has no doubt that Cramer will leave a lasting impression on those who are lucky enough to cross his path.
"We've had some exceptional guys on our team the past few years, but all of them had been playing twice as long as Jim," Mayes said. "For a guy to step in and throw himself into it, and develop the leadership skills ... we're fortunate he found us."
