Gold’s Sullivan : There’s No Place Like Home

If Tom Sullivan had a bad day on the Denver Gold preseason practice field at Cal State Northridge, he could have walked a couple of blocks home for a warm bath.

Not home to the dorms.

Home .

Sullivan, the Gold’s defensive back, was raised in Northridge. His family lives a block from the dormitories that he and his teammates have lived in the past month.

“It has made things much more comfortable,” Sullivan said. “I am able to go home and have a good meal every now and then instead of eating the training table food. . . .

“I have the family come out and watch practice. And I have friends to talk to every day as opposed to maybe once a week when I’m in Denver.”

Friends and family are important to Sullivan, a clean-cut kid who attended Crespi High, a Catholic school. While he enjoyed playing on the Celts’ basketball and baseball teams, he was best known as a wide receiver on the football team.

Crespi teammate Kevin Williams went on to star on the USC football team before rejoining Sullivan on the Gold. But Sullivan wasn’t sure where he wanted to play after graduating in 1978.

Not until a week before summer football training camp started, in fact, did he decide to attend UCLA and play football.

“A week before football started at UCLA I decided to change schools and go ahead and try to play at UCLA, so I walked on as a wide receiver,” Sullivan said. He had been offered a baseball and basketball scholarship at UC Irvine but chose to take his chances as a football walk-on at UCLA.

By his second year at UCLA, after he had been converted from wide receiver to strong safety, he was given a scholarship. In 1983 he was part of a UCLA defense that intercepted three Michigan passes in the Bruins’ 24-14 Rose Bowl upset of Michigan.

Sullivan’s transition from offense to defense wasn’t an easy one, but he has no regrets.

“I see some of the receivers and I think I could still be playing receiver. But then everyone likes to be a touchdown hero.” he said. “But defense is fine and I’m enjoying it.”

The transition from college to professional football was even easier for Sullivan.

“Pro football was just another step after college,” he said.

Sullivan, after having been a third-round choice of the Gold, had immediate success in the United States Football League, starting as a strong safety.

As a rookie, he had five interceptions, which tied him with two others for sixth in the league. He had 64 solo tackles and 105 overall.

“He has a very good knack of reading the routes and being in the right place at the right time,” Gold Coach Mouse Davis said. “There are faster DB’s in the world. There are stronger DB’s in the world, but he certainly plays the mind game very well and is a very strong contributor to our secondary at this time.”

Sullivan comes from an athletically inclined family.

His father, John, was a running back at Holy Cross University in the ‘50s. His older brother John, 30, preceded him at UCLA in 1973-75 playing, at various times, quarterback, tight end and fullback. He also punted. His younger brother Chris was a wide receiver and defensive back at Cal State Northridge for three years.

The second of the three boys, Tom said jokingly, “You can never get enough football.”

Sullivan said because of all the athletic ability in the family his success is sometimes taken for granted.

“Football has kind of been part of our family for so long they take it in stride and actually sometimes when you think you deserve a pat on the back or something they kind of just say, ‘Way to go,’ and don’t make a big deal of it. But they are real supportive,” he said.

Sullivan’s brother Chris, 22, was influenced considerably by Tom’s dedication and hard work as a redshirt and walk-on at UCLA.

“Seeing him make it as a walk-on was real good and encouraging,” Chris said. “Tom always told me to play to the end and always stress to win.”

Chris, who was a quarterback for Crespi, was offered a football scholarship at University of Pacific. But before leaving for Stockton, Northridge head football Coach Tom Keele became involved.

Informed of Chris’s talent, Keele offered him a scholarship. Chris played for three years before deciding to pursue his academics more.

Tom seems already to have his future, both on and off the field, pretty well mapped out.

During the off-season he got his real estate license and plans to work with his brother John, who is active in commercial real estate in Laguna Hills and Orange County.

But for now, it’s football.

Sullivan’s contract with the Gold expires at the end of the season. Sullivan says there is a possibility he will be playing in the NFL next year, “depending on how things go this year and if Denver wants me back.”

He said that negotiations are in the preliminary stages with a few NFL teams, which he declined to name, but he hasn’t ruled out the possibility of returning to play for the Gold next season.

Said Sullivan: “I am not happy to be leaving now, but I am happy to be getting the season started and that means going to Denver. It’s the inevitable.”