Noah Sullivan grew up playing baseball in his backyard. Literally.
Behind Sullivan’s childhood home lies the baseball complex that he grew up playing in. There was no easy escape from baseball in a household that would raise three college baseball players. At one point, for convenience, Sullivan’s grandfather installed a gate in the backyard fence so that the Sullivan kids could go to and from the fields whenever they wanted.
“If the Little League fields were open, they would just open the gate, walk over into the Little League fields and use the batting cages if they were available,” said Phillip Sullivan, Noah’s father. “That’s one of those things where they took the initiative. They were willing to take a bucket of balls, a batting tee and a bat and go over there and do work without a coach, without the father, without somebody yelling and screaming at them.”
The Orlando native is the youngest of four brothers, all of whom went on to play college sports. Brothers Matthew and Jason went on to play baseball at West Florida and lacrosse at Cleveland State, respectively. Sullivan’s third brother, William, played baseball at Troy and was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals in 2023.
Sullivan grew up following in his brothers’ footsteps. Having three older brothers meant being dragged along to go watch their games, which turned into wanting to do what they were doing.
“He was raised on their sports and I’m going to say he was raised on ESPN,” Phillip Sullivan said. “Other kids were raised on ‘Barney’ or kids shows, he was raised on ESPN because that’s what the older son was watching or that’s what I was watching. Kind of monkey see, monkey do. 'I want to be like my older brother, I want to be like my older brothers. They’re having success doing something, I want to do that, too.'”
Being the youngest of four brothers also gave Noah Sullivan the hatred of losing that he still has today.
“Noah is the youngest of four, maybe the most driven just from – he hates losing, he hates failure,” Phillip Sullivan said. “I have three older brothers, too, so Noah and I are a lot alike, so that’s a scary combination at times because we might butt heads. But he’s driven. He’s where he is because of it, but it’s also probably stunted his growth at times just because of too much pressure, too much emotion. He’s driven, he wants to win, he wants to achieve, he wants to be good and he works at it.”
Noah Sullivan was still in high school when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and suspended sports. With nothing else to do, Sullivan went back out through the backyard gate and put in hours of work on the diamond. A trip to a Play It Again Sports in Lakeland produced a home gym in the garage, and that was enough to more than just stay busy during the pandemic.
“We were able to do whatever we wanted throughout that tough time,” Sullivan said. “But it was a time for me that allowed me to grow and get exponentially better compared to other guys.”
But the pandemic that helped shape the Sullivan of today also had some complications. The pandemic ended Sullivan’s junior season early, which made finding a landing spot to play college baseball that much harder.
“That junior summer is probably one of, if not the most important, summers just for the entire recruiting (process),” Sullivan said. “But with the pandemic going on, you’d just mass-send videos and try to get recruiting done that way just because nobody was allowed to be there in person.”
But Sullivan had an in with USC Upstate through a travel baseball coach, and he ended up suiting up for the Spartans for three years.
Big numbers in the Big South
Kane Sweeney, who oversaw USC Upstate’s offense during Sullivan’s tenure and is now the Spartans’ head coach, took a liking to Sullivan immediately. With the pandemic shutting ...
