By Collin McShane ’19
THE ROUNDUP

Have you ever seen a video or photo of a Brophy football game?

One of the Brophy student cameramen started working professionally for the Arizona Cardinals this year.

Will Yalam ’17 was asked on a whim to do photography and video for the Brophy Varsity football team by his friend Nick Marisola ’17, and has loved it since.

“He started filming for the [varsity football] team right after I did,” Marisola said. “I offered him the job and he jumped on it.”

Yalam made a connection with someone who works for the Arizona Cardinals and landed a gig with the NFL.

“I was an intern in the Cardinals video department; I was basically on the lowest rung of the ladder, but I could do most anything and go anywhere in the stadium I wanted at any time,”  Yalam said in an email. “I even had a higher access level than a lot of people I saw and interacted with.”

Because of his job, Yalam got a behind the scenes look at what the Cardinals do, and how they operate day to day.

“Working for the Cardinals was awesome; I got an up-close look on what goes into running an NFL team and what happens before, during and after games beyond what everyone sees on TV,” Yalam said. “It was always something new every game. One day, I might see the best game of the season, the next I might meet the Cardinals’ star running back David Johnson.”

Although he very much enjoyed it, it would also seem as though it was a once in a lifetime opportunity.

“It is not something the Cardinals or other professional sports teams do very often, I am the only high school student I know of who worked for an NFL team,” Yalam said over email. “In fact, when I would go to their practice facility, I could not wear any Brophy gear because they did not want the NFL to learn they had a high school student working for them.”

Others have noticed Yalams work – The Arizona Republic and World News wrote about the high schoolers job.

“I initially did not care much for the Cardinals, I paid attention to them, but there were other teams I liked more,” Yalam said.“Now, they’re my favorite team and one of the top teams on my list of teams to work for in the future.”