Stephen Sullivan blown away by path from living under a freeway to unlikely Seahawks debut
The 49ers were bullying the Seahawks around at the start.
But on third down at Seattle’s 37-yard line, San Francisco got cute.
Stephen Sullivan doesn’t do cute.
Wildcat formation. A direct snap to running back Jerick McKinnon. As McKinnon ran into a 49ers teammate in his own backfield, Sullivan crashed into them. A 3-yard loss. Out of field-goal range, the Niners punted instead.
It wasn’t just Sullivan’s first play in the NFL.
It was the remarkable 23-year-old rookie’s first play at defensive end since high school.
“I didn’t see this is in a million years,” Sullivan said after Seattle’s 37-27 victory.
How could he? Growing up he was too focused on looking for where to sleep.
“He made a tackle on the first play,” Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said. “Just to do that is a cool thing.
“Just for him to be out there.”
Switching from tight end to defensive end in Seahawks practices a few weeks ago? Getting promoted off the practice squad Saturday then into the first third down of a key NFC West game at his new position on Sunday, because Seattle’s been losing so many defensive linemen to injuries?
All that—all of pro football—doesn’t exactly spook perhaps the most unlikely Seahawk on this 6-1 team.
“Obviously,” quarterback Russell Wilson said, “he’s a champion.”
In far more ways than just the national title he won last year at LSU.
Hungry and cold
Sullivan still remembers his father beating his mother. He remembers his dad using cocaine in front of his mom, his brothers and him.
He can still see his mom and dad being taken away to jail. He remembers the fear of being taken from the hotel they’d been living in temporarily, the one from which his school bus picked him up every day. He can still feel the cold, scared nights trying to sleep under a freeway overpass.
He lived with a little league coach for a while. Then with an aunt. The aunt’s daughter and Sullivan lived for a while in a trailer. Some days, they didn’t eat. He went days and nights without hot meals. Clean clothes for school were a luxury.
He bounced between friends and family in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and his native Donaldsonville, Louisiana.
Sunday, he was blowing into the 49ers’ backfield to make a third-down stop that had been so few this season on Seattle’s last-ranked defense.
The official game statistics say that was the only tackle Sullivan had in 22 snaps in a situational role as a third-down edge rusher, one with as much NFL game experience before Sunday as you had.
To Sullivan, that tackle, this day, meant so much more.
“How I grew up is how I grew up,” he said. “Every kid has their story. I don’t try to go around telling people for them to feel sorry for me.
“I keep it in my pocket. If you know, then you know. I just use it as motivation, honestly.
“How I grew up is how I grew up. I can’t do anything about it. It got me here.
“So who’s to say it didn’t help me get to this point, you know?”
Michelle Macloud helped him get here, too.
She’s the librarian at Donaldsonville High School in Louisiana, where and when Sullivan found a guardian he could trust.
“That’s when I met my mentor, Ms. Michelle. She helped out,” Sullivan said that April Saturday when the Seahawks drafted him in the seventh and final round.
“She made sure that I ate and things like that,” he said.
He became all-state in football, a bigger, faster and better receiver than everyone he played. LSU gave him a football scholarship.
He finally had his own place to live.
The last couple years the 6-foot-5, 248-pound Sullivan became attractive to NFL scouts because of his big body and ability to split out wide and run quick routes. But the most catches he had in a season at LSU was only 23, with two touchdowns, in 2018. He won a national title last season as a part-time receiver for the loaded Tigers.
How Seahawks found him
LSU coach Ed Orgeron is a former assistant at USC under Carroll. Orgeron tipped off this old boss about Sullivan. He told Carroll of what Sullivan overcame to be in the NFL’s draft class.
Carroll and the Seahawks were so impressed they traded back into the final round, after they thought they were done picking for the year, to select Sullivan.
He showed flashes of his athleticism in training camp. But he mostly listened and learned behind Seattle’s stock group of veteran tight ends: Greg Olsen, Will Dissly, Luke Willson and Jacob Hollister. Sullivan wasn’t even the top rookie tight end; the Seahawks drafted Colby Parkinson from Stanford in the fourth round.
Then edge rusher Bruce Irvin had season-ending knee surgery. Top rookie pass rusher and end Darrell Taylor, the second-round pick, still hasn’t practiced for Seattle following leg surgery in January. End Rasheem Green got a nerve injury in his neck in September. He hasn’t played since.
Carroll and defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr. considered Sullivan’s height and receiver’s speed and decided to make him the defensive end they needed. He began practicing there in early October.
Then last week starting end Benson Mayowa injured his ankle in Seattle’s overtime loss at Arizona. Mayowa missed his first game this season on Sunday against the 49ers.
Sullivan played. At the position he began learning only weeks ago.
“I was really fired up that he got a chance to go,” Carroll said.
“He’s such a good athlete, and he was willing to change from playing tight end to go to rush the passer in the middle of his rookie season. It’s just a great team move that he made, because we needed his help. ...
“That’s why this game was very inspirational game in our locker room, because a lot of guys had to step up so that we could go. And then we went out and played well, too. That’s a lot to ask guys, but they came through.
“Sully was one of those guys.”
After the game, Sullivan was blown away.
No wonder.
“I couldn’t tell you that right here, right now I would be playing defensive end in the NFL. I didn’t see this coming at all, to be honest with you,” Sullivan said. “Just being out there is a dream come true, even if I (hadn’’t touched) the field. Just being on that sideline would be a dream come true for me.
“Coming up where I come from a lot of guys don’t make it this far. I’m definitely special. And I’m blessed to be in this position, for sure.”
This story was originally published November 2, 2020 at 6:47 AM with the headline "Stephen Sullivan blown away by path from living under a freeway to unlikely Seahawks debut."
