Did you extract the correct dirver jar file from the binary distribution Zip file? You need a file named mysql-connector-java-[version] -bin.jar .
From the connector-j.html page in the MySQL /docs folder:
1.2.1. Installing Connector/J from a Binary Distribution
The easiest method of installation is to use the binary distribution of the Connector/J package. The binary distribution is available either as a Tar/Gzip or Zip file which you must extract to a suitable location and then optionally make the information about the package available by changing your CLASSPATH (see Section 1.2.2, “Installing the Driver and Configuring the CLASSPATH” ).mysql-connector-java-[version] -bin.jar , and starting with Connector/J 3.1.8 a debug build of the driver in a file named mysql-connector-java-[version] -bin-g.jar.
1.2.2. Installing the Driver and Configuring the CLASSPATH
Once you have extracted the distribution archive, you can install the driver by placing mysql-connector-java-[version]-bin.jar in your classpath, either by adding the full path to it to your CLASSPATH environment variable, or by directly specifying it with the command line switch -cp when starting your JVM. If you are going to use the driver with the JDBC DriverManager, you would use com.mysql.jdbc.Driver as the class that implements java.sql.Driver.
Update : The com.mysql.jdbc.Driver did not work with connection pooling enabled but the com.mysql.jdbc.jdbc2.optional.MysqlConnectionPoolDataSource driver does work (see below)
Connection Properties
Transaction Type: LOCAL_TRANSACTION
DataSource Class: com.mysql.jdbc.jdbc2.optional.MysqlConnectionPoolDataSource
serverName localhost
user root
password <password>
Retype password <password>
databaseName <MySQL database name>
portNumber 3306
networkProtocol <empty>
Other Properties <empty>Mark