The outpouring of personal interest stories about J.T. O'Sullivan recently is giving me cramps. In yesterday's Merc, even Dan Brown got in the act. Brown's is probably the best written article on the subject. It's definitely the most well-researched. But in some ways, it's also the most bothersome. It's bothersome because it's a huge waste of everybody's time.When he's not haunting Ellen Page, O'Sullivan is employed as a third-string Quarterback by every team in the NFL.
Third-string. He's not taking reps with the first team, he's not taking reps with the second team. Third-string. He's gone from backing up the guy who backed up Jon Kitna to backing up the guy who backs up Alex Smith. Is that really all that newsworthy? At this point, I'd rather read about the guy who does the 49ers laundry because he has just about as good a chance as O'Sullivan as getting on the field for the opener.
Some of the writers went monkeyshit crazy when Nolan said O'Sullivan was in the running for the starting spot. But read what Nolan has actually been saying. Here's Nolan on KNBR (audio link) last week:
These guys [Smith and Hill] are competing for this job because both of them, for different reasons, have the ability to score points and lead this team ... O’Sullivan will compete for the job, not as much as Alex and Shaun, early on at least.So O'Sullivan won't compete early, but he will get a chance later? One of the most frequent arguments for giving O'Sullivan a shot is his familiarity with the Mike Martz play book. That is something that will take Smith and Hill time to digest. But with each day of practice, Smith and Hill grow more familiar with the offense and O'Sullivan's advantage dissipates. So O'Sullivan's time to compete is EARLIER, not later.
So how, exactly, is O'Sullivan supposed to supplant both Smith and Hill when O'Sullivan is 1) not competing with Smith and Hill early on and 2) when he does get reps, he's pitching to the third string? Answer: he's not. He's there in case the two guys in front of him get hurt.
So how about some stories on more interesting members of the team?
Related reading:
Barrows keeps a level head on O'Sullivan ... consistently.
So does Kawakami.
Scott Ostler says O'Sullivan might be the front runner.
Mark Maske makes the familiar-with-the-system argument. (The Washington Post has a sports writer? And he writes up the 9ers?)
