O'Sullivan leading 49ers in the right direction even if was just preseason
By Andy Lopusnak, Bay Area Sports Drive Magazine
August 29, 2008

It's been an eventful preseason for the San Francisco 49ers offense. The team racked up the most total yards in a preseason game in over a decade when the 49ers compiled 425 at Chicago. San Francisco has also had the most points in a game, 37 also against the Bears, in almost twenty years. This should seem like fantastic news for an offense that was dead last in the NFL last season in nearly every statistical category. However, it is still the preseason when teams worry more about getting video of players than the scoreboard or yardage total.

After all, the New England Patriots, the first team in NFL history to go 16-0 in the regular season, went winless this preseason (0-4), while the 49ers were a muffed punt return away from posting just their third winning preseason in the last 14 years.

Nonetheless, if the 49ers can even show a glimmer of this offensive fortitude come Week One of the regular season, the 2008 year could be very exciting. An unexpected surprise for the upcoming season is the emergence of little-known J.T. O'Sullivan as the team's starting quarterback. There was much hype over Shaun Hill getting the job. Hill was one of the lone highlights offensively last season when he completed 68.4% of his passes with five touchdowns to just one interception while going 2-0 as a starter at the end of an abysmal year that featured four different starting QBs.

Some felt that the arrival of Mike Martz, the team's fifth different offensive coordinator in five years, might be the spark former number-one overall selection Alex Smith needed. Neither happened as O'Sullivan's on-the-field performance outshined them both.

With the starting quarterback gig wrapped up, O'Sullivan didn't even play in last Friday's exhibition finale, a 20-17 loss to San Diego, but in three contests he completed 62.5% of his passes (20-of-32) for 20-of-32 for 351 yards with two touchdowns and two interceptions for a 91.8 passer rating. He averaged 10.6 yards per pass attempt while Smith and Hill barely had half as much per attempt in the preseason..

"(O'Sullivan) probably got the better command between the three (QBs)," said 49ers head coach Mike Nolan on naming O'Sullivan the team's starting QB. "He played with consistency and we moved the ball well as a unit. We scored points, we did the things that I think our really important playing that position. I'm very confident that J.T. [O'Sullivan] is at the point where he's our best man for the job right now."

O'Sullivan enters his seventh NFL season in 2008 and has played for seven different teams, but only got some NFL action last year (in his sixth NFL year), completing just 13-of-26 for 148 yards with an touchdown and two interceptions as a member of the Detroit Lions. Yes, he was there with Martz, but most speculated that at best O'Sullivan would be the backup or emergency QB because of his familiarity with Martz's complex offense.

A graduate of nearby UC-Davis, O'Sullivan isn't the first former Aggies QB to play for the 49ers. Mike Moroski played in 15 games for San Francisco in 1986 and threw two touchdowns and three interceptions. The team drafted Scott Barry in the sixth round of 1985, but he didn't make the squad even though the QBs coach that year was former UC-Davis coach Paul Hackett. Kevin Daft, the QB that O'Sullivan replaced at UC-Davis, was briefly with the 49ers in 2001.

Little Division II UC-Davis ties to the Bay Area run even deeper than the 49ers. The area's local Arena Football team, the San Jose SaberCats, also has a former UC-Davis alum at the QB helm. Mark Grieb is one of the best in his sport and is a two-time ArenaBowl Most Valuable Player. This past 2008 AFL season, Grieb led the indoor league with 100 passing scores and took his team to the ArenaBowl, that league's championship game, for the fourth time in seven seasons. Since the SaberCats started their run as a dynasty in the spring of 2002, the 49ers haven't even come close to a playoff berth.

Maybe this will change with a former UC-Davis Aggies quarterback leading the Niners this season. After all, San Francisco's new offensive coordinator, Mike Martz, does love former AFL players like Kurt Warner, who led the St. Louis Rams to a Super Bowl win in his first full NFL season. Packing the bags for Tampa in February for Super Bowl XLIII seems unlikely but anything's possible and Mike Martz has proven this in the past. Now it's J.T. O'Sullivan's turn.