Jack Eshleman ’25 made history over the summer by becoming the first Hamilton baseball player to sign a major or minor league contract. As an outfielder who converted to a pitcher once reaching college, with a fastball that can reach 95 mph, Eshleman signed with the Toronto Blue Jays.
Eshleman’s normal has been turned upside down as he puts his college career on hold. He has moved to Florida to join the Florida Complex League (FCL) Blue Jays, a Rookie-level affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays. Eshleman will get the chance to join the Blue Jays’ farm system and compete in spring training with the team later this year.
Eshleman hopes that he can “come back and finish [his] degree at Hamilton when this is all over” but for now is putting school on the back-burner. On a visit back to the Hill, Eshleman had time to sit down and answer some of our questions about the process.
When looking back, playing baseball professionally was never in the cards. Eshleman chose Hamilton for its “combination of athletics and academics” that perfectly fit him, not for its professional potential. The idea of signing a contract like this “did not even come up until this summer,” something that the stats support. Eshleman broke out in the past year, as he ranked 18th in all of Division III with a 2.05 earned run average, 10th with a 0.91 WHIP, 26th with a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 5.75 and 34th with 6.32 hits allowed per nine innings. His opponents hit just .199 against him with one home run, and he struck out a Hamilton-record 69 batters.
Growing up in Pennsylvania as a Phillies fan, Toronto was never Eshleman’s favorite team, but he is grateful for the opportunity they have provided. The team’s triple-A team is in Buffalo, only a short drive away, making them a prime candidate for scouting Hamilton talent.
Eshleman’s favorite memory at Hamilton is not a statistic; it was the “intense rivalry” with NESCAC schools, peaking in last season’s game against Middlebury, a pitching duel that ended in a 4–3 win in which Eshleman threw a complete game. Eshleman said that these games were always something that “he wanted to win,” especially after Middlebury beat Hamilton in the NESCAC tournament the year prior. “Anyone in a sport, or anyone in general can tell you that those games just mean more,” Eshleman said. The team would go on to lose the series and Eshleman would throw two other complete games, but the NESCAC rivalry made this the game to remember.
Eshleman has a long list of incredible stats as he ended up second on the program’s all-time list with 162 strikeouts in 122.2 innings pitched. He won nine games, lost just four and posted a team-record 2.57 earned run average (minimum 90 innings pitched).
Of the 15 collegiate athletes signed by the Blue Jays this summer, Eshleman was the only DIII athlete. The others played DI or a high level of travel ball. “Around me are guys in the power 5 conferences, schools like LSU and Virginia, where you watch them and know they are going to be major leaguers with long careers,” Eshleman said. Because of this, Eshleman is proud to be among them and always shows off his school pride. Eshleman often “has to explain what Hamilton is,” but he “wears the Hamilton name proudly on [his] chest.”
Surrounded by Toronto stars on rehab journeys and college students from programs that churn out MLB stars, Hamilton’s very own Jack Eshleman is proud to have been a Continental.
