O'Sullivans are All-American brothers

08-07-2007

By Tom Shanahan, San Diego Hall of Champions

Ryan O’Sullivan first started tagging along with big brother Sean about the time he could walk, and the destinations soon enough included the baseball field.

He followed him through youth leagues.

“I’ve never had an interest in playing anything but baseball,” he said. “Baseball is a year-round thing, and it just came natural to me.”

Through travel leagues, when Ryan was sometimes invited by the coaches to play up an age group with Sean and his teammates.

Through high school, when Ryan joined Sean on the varsity in the 2005 season at Valhalla High. Ryan was a freshman when Sean was a senior, and both have been All-Grossmont South League and All-CIF selections for the Norsemen.

And now, as it turns, Ryan has followed Sean’s prodigious footsteps all the way to the Aflac All-American High School Baseball Classic.

They’re the first brothers to be named Aflac All-Americans as Ryan, a pitcher and shortstop entering his senior season, plays in the fifth annual Aflac game at noon on Saturday at San Diego State’s Tony Gwynn Stadium.

Sean played in the 2004 Aflac game when Ryan was still in middle school and the family attended the game in Aberdeen, Md.

“That was one my goals – to make the Aflac game – as soon as Sean made it,” Ryan said. “I was anxious about making it. I always try to match or break what he’s doing; it’s a good pressure, not a bad pressure.”

Ryan watched every move of Sean’s in Maryland, but Sean, a second-round draft pick by the Los Angeles Angels, will have to watch on TV as he plays for the Angels’ A League team in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where he is leading the league with a 2.43 ERA.

Ryan, a 6-foot-1, 180-pounder, recently committed to San Diego State, following another page from his brother, although Sean never played for the Aztecs before signing a pro contract. He said Sean has been his coach-by-example for as long as he’s learned the game.

“I’ve learned from his mistakes, but mostly I’ve learned from what he does right,” Ryan said. “I used to watch how he would prepare before a game, what he did in the batting cage and what he did all week to get ready for the next game.”

What he wasn’t prepared for was to fall into the same trap of swinging at bad pitches that Sean succumbed to as a senior. Dominant high school football and basketball players can dominate no matter the competition, but baseball is unique. When a high school player is coming off a big year, opponents don’t give them anything to hit the next season.

It happened to Sean during a frustrating senior year.

“He told me, ‘You saw what happened to me; don’t let it happen to you.’ ” Ryan said.

It was one of the few examples of Ryan not learning from Sean. Ryan said he tried too hard to carry the team as a junior when teams pitched around him.

“I only saw about one fastball a game, and it was usually right at me or way outside,” he said. “I put a lot of pressure on myself to produce, and I swung at a lot of bad balls. Now I know you can’t hit a curveball in the dirt.”

Hitting .341 with four home runs and 33 RBIs may have been a down year for O’Sullivan, but his spring didn’t slow down his summer. He was invited to the national events throughout the summer to perform before amateur and pro scouts in Cincinnati, North Carolina and Georgia.

He played in the Area Code Games in Long Beach until Tuesday when he returned home to prepare for the Aflac game.

“It’s sweet to be the hometown boy in the Aflac game,” Ryan said. “Sean said to relax. He said to tune out the cameras and have a good time.”

He hasn’t gotten bad advice yet from his big brother.

Tom Shanahan can be contacted at 619-699-2334 or toms@sdhoc.com.