Daryl Zaslow has already emerged as one of New Jersey's leading trial lawyers; peers say he's a fiercely competitive practitioner who has earned the respect and confidence of partners, adversaries and clients alike. At 40, the Holmdel native has tackled - and prevailed in - some of the more complex civil cases litigated in the region. Moreover, after several years as a partner at a prominent New Jersey firm, Zaslow this year joined as a named partner the firm of Eichen Crutchlow Zaslow & McElroy, with offices in Red Bank, Toms River and Edison. The firm has a strong record of success in personal injury and medical malpractice litigation, and Zaslow is part of the firm's, and the profession's, New Guard, poised to lead in the years ahead. And yet, for his early successes as a trial lawyer, Zaslow remains well grounded, with genuine enthusiasm and passion for his craft. It's helped to have a stable rhythm to his life: Today he, his wife and two young children, live four doors up the block from the house he grew up in. Zaslow's competitiveness and leadership showed up early: Through the seasons he was Holmdel High School's starting quarterback, point guard and All-County catcher - he won a baseball scholarship to The College of William & Mary, where as a District III Academic All-American he captained a squad that set a school record for wins. Even then Zaslow envisioned becoming a courtroom lawyer: "Of course, everyone who has ever played dreams of going to 'The Show'. But I was always focused on going to law school whenever my baseball career ended." To Zaslow trying cases is "the closest any profession comes to having clear winners and losers - the competitor in me always wanted to be in the courtroom." After law school he joined a medical malpractice defense firm, and despite a lifetime of admiring the medical profession (including his father, a dentist) Zaslow says he quickly became disenchanted with defense work when he routinely observed the immense and unnecessary damages caused by medical negligence. Still in his late 20s, Zaslow jumped to a plaintiffs' firm that allowed young lawyers to develop and handle their own cases. He got noticed early, routinely bringing back six-figure verdicts in cases with only $15,000 of insurance coverage where the defendants still refused to make his clients a settlement offer. In recent years Zaslow has established a reputation as a tenacious trial attorney who regularly obtains remarkable results for clients. He has won multi-million-dollar verdicts in cases involving permanent brachial plexus injuries sustained by children at birth and in the emotionally wrought and exceedingly complex area of malpractice involving errors in the prenatal diagnosis of birth defects. His secret? "I'm admittedly obsessive about my cases. I love what I do, and the competition of trying cases. As such, I am constantly looking for ways to win at trial and obtain the best results for my clients." When he is not obsessing about his next trial and can get away he enjoys fly-fishing.