Stanford's newest member of the most interesting man club
Make some room Stanford offensive linemen, there’s a new name to add to Stanford most interesting man club. His name is Jose Joaquin Arcega-Whiteside.
During the USC broadcast viewers were introduced to the five starting members of Stanford’s offensive line, each of whom shared a fun fact about their studies or interests as they were declared “the most interesting offensive line in the country.” There is some competition for that designation on Stanford’s roster, including a redshirt freshman receiver.
Arcega-Whiteside launched himself into the national spotlight with his catch against UCLA Saturday that gave Stanford a lead with 24 seconds left in the game. But the origin of his ability to make that play started in a basketball family in Spain.
He was born in Zaragoza, the same city as his father, Joaquin, who was a professional basketball player. Joaquin’s brothers, Fernando and Jose, played for Spain’s Olympic team in 1984, losing twice to the USA gold-medal squad led by young stars Michael Jordan and Patrick Ewing.
J.J.'s mother, Valorie Whiteside, played basketball at Appalachian State. She wanted to keep playing professionally and decided to go from Boone, North Carolina to Spain, where she met Joaquin after a game.
A few years after J.J. was born the young family moved to Lisbon because of basketball. It was there that the future Stanford student began his earliest education at a school for Spanish speakers. He had to start by learning three languages.
“From what my parents told me, it was a combination of English, Spanish and Portuguese,” J.J. said of which language he learned first. “So they didn’t know what I was saying. Eventually they started sorting it out because my mom at the time really only spoke English. My dad spoke Spanish. And I was living in Portugal when I started to learn how to speak and I was speaking a combination of all three languages. I started sorting each out with whoever I was talking to.”
J.J. traveled throughout Europe with his parents for basketball tournaments until they moved to South Carolina when he was six years old. He attended Dorman High in Roebuck, where his mother is the girls basketball coach. His father works for BMW, J.J. said.
J.J. gravitated toward football, making the decision early in high school that it was the sport he’d pursue in college. Even though as a sophomore he’d yet to garner any recruiting attention, he already had two top choices.
He remembers watching the 2014 Rose Bowl between Stanford and Michigan State and telling his dad he wanted to go to one of those schools. He said when offers started rolling in from ACC and SEC programs, there were only two non-East Coast schools that offered scholarships, Stanford and Michigan State.
“But in the back of my mind I knew I wanted to go to Stanford,” J.J. said. “I love the people at this place.”
Head coach David Shaw recalled the recruitment as a classic example of Stanford reaching across the country to find a good fit for the locker room and the offense. Running backs coach Lance Taylor spotted J.J.’s ability and alerted Shaw.
“He brought him (Arcega-Whiteside) to us and said, ‘Hey, we’ve got this guy who has this film’ -- and with high school film you never know level of competition and those things -- ‘and this guy makes plays every single game. He’s a great basketball player, a great track runner, a great athlete. By all accounts he’s a great kid and a great student.’
“Thankfully his parents were able to talk him into coming out for camp and he was great. He had a lot to learn as a route runner -- as a lot of young, taller receivers have a lot to learn as route runners. The guy caught everything. He has great hands and a great mentality. He’s very competitive. He wanted to be here and worked his tail off to get here.”
After redshirting his first year on campus, J.J. started this season behind Michael Rector, Trenton Irwin and Francis Owusu on the depth chart. But his number was called when Owusu suffered a concussion after a helmet-to-helmet hit against UCLA.
Suddenly the young receiver without a career reception was thrust into a game in which Stanford’s offense was struggling. But his position coach, Tavita Pritchard, saw the steadiness of a well-prepared player.
“He’s a guy who has worked extremely hard and has been biding his time, waiting for his opportunity,” Pritchard said. “And you saw the fruit of that -- a guy who stayed prepared and is ready to go in there. When he gets his chance he makes three catches and probably the best catch of his life, thus far. We’re hoping for a couple more.”
The catch was a simple-looking play that relied on Ryan Burns putting the right touch on the pass to give J.J. the chance to wall off the cornerback and make the grab. It was a play the two executed many times last year on the scout team.
“Ryan called double fade, looked up and kind of made eye contact with me,” J.J. said. “I just nodded my head. He nodded his head and that was it. We knew it was going to happen. The mechanics and the way the play went, nothing was different (from last year). When it actually gets called, it’s almost natural to us now.”
When J.J. got up with the ball clutched firmly in his hand and the Stanford fans the only ones cheering in the Rose Bowl, the Cardinal receiver said it was all a blur.
“Those are the moments you dream about as a kid,” he said. “As a kid you think to yourself, ‘If this ever happens to me, how am I going react?’ You do all kinds of different reactions, posing in the mirror, going in the backyard and acting in your head. But when it happens, your mind goes blank and the way you react is how you naturally feel.”
The euphoria continued after the game, even when he saw his cell phone overflowing with messages.
“I’ll tell you, my mom is probably not happy with my (cell phone) data right now,” he smiled. “It definitely sky rocketed.”
By Monday J.J. was back at Stanford for the first day of fall quarter. He had a class to get to after the press conference.
“I kind of like it better that way,” he said of classes starting. “It makes things more realistic and puts things in better perspective that we have other things to worry about as well.”
