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Chattanooga Mocs' Davis Tull taken by New Orleans Saints in fifth round
Everywhere else, the sports world was still on hold Saturday afternoon. The Kentucky Derby was still more than four hours away. The San Antonio Spurs versus the Los Angeles Clippers -- perhaps the biggest NBA opening-round Game 7 ever -- wouldn't tip off for six more hours. The fight of the 21st century -- Floyd Mayweather versus Manny Pacquiao -- was still at least 10 hours hours from opening bell.
But for Davis Tull and University of Tennessee at Chattanooga football fans the country over, 2:08 EDT Saturday afternoon will go down as the sports highlight of May 2, 2015.
That's when Tull became the 148th player taken in the NFL draft, going to the New Orleans Saints in round five. That's when one of college football's best people -- not just a great talent at defensive end or outside linebacker, but a great person -- realized a lifelong dream of having a legitimate chance to play on Sundays.
"I started watching (the draft) seriously on Friday night during the third round," Tull said from his Knoxville home early Saturday evening, not long after the draft ended and American Pharoah won the Derby.
"I'd heard some talk I might go in the third, but I think my shoulder injury (torn labrum) hurt me a little bit. But I'm thrilled. New Orleans was one of the places I hoped would take me."
He didn't grow up following pro football all that closely, at least not by teams.
"I liked individual players," Tull said. "But when you grow up in Knoxville, there's University of Tennessee football and not much else. Everybody's on that Big Orange train."
But the Big Orange train never stopped for Tull at Bearden High School. So he walked on at UTC, which was probably the best unexpected gift Mocs coach Russ Huesman ever received.
"It only took one or two practices to know Davis had talent," Huesman said moments after the pick was announced. "All you had to do was watch him moving around and see how hard he worked to know he was somebody special."
That somebody special became a three-time FCS All-American, a three-time Southern Conference defensive player of the year and the SoCon record holder for most career sacks with 37. But the numbers, however magnificent, aren't necessarily what Huesman will most fondly recall about his four-year starter.
"It's a great deal for Davis -- what a football player he is," Huesman said. "And I promise you that he could have played at Tennessee or anywhere else he'd wanted to walk on. But he's an even better person and student. How many Academic All-Americans wind up being drafted in the NFL?"
In a draft that included overall No. 1 Jameis "Shame Us" Winston, as immature a draft-topper as we've ever seen, that alone surely helped Tull impress scouts weary of poring through psychological testing to determine whether to invest six figures or more on a bum or nut job.
But his toughness in a pro day workout may have had as much to do with being drafted as his character. His labrum already torn, he bench-pressed 225 pounds a stunning 26 times, though Tull insists he did even better than that.
"I actually did 28," he said. "They took two away from me. They actually told me not to bench because of the shoulder, but a guy from a small school doesn't get many breaks. I thought I needed to show them what I could do."
What can't be taken from the UTC program is what it could mean to future recruiting to have a former walk-on become a fifth-round draft pick.
"When these kids see 'Chattanooga' scroll across the screen, that's huge," Huesman said. "Something like that always helps recruiting."
It may also help recruiting within the Volunteer State that the drafting of Tull allowed the Mocs to beat the Vols 1-0 in draft picks, since big brother UT failed to have a single player selected for the first time since 1963.
"Yeah, that's pretty cool," noted Tull, whose teenage dream was to ride that Big Orange train.
There is nothing cool about the food he's about to encounter daily in the Big Easy, however. It's often heavy on cayenne pepper and other spices, and Tull says he instantly fell in love with Cajun cuisine during a late-winter visit to meet the Saints brass.
"The food's incredible," he said. "I loved the red beans, rice and sausage and the fried crawfish. I gained five pounds in two days. I don't think I'm going to have any more trouble keeping my weight up."
It's now a wait of a different kind for at least a few of Tull's teammates, beginning with defensive lineman Derrick Lott, running back Keon Williams and tight end Faysal Safaat, who were all considered draft possibilities and are all expected to earn NFL training-camp invitations.
But that could take a week or more to sort out. In the meantime, Moc Maniacs surely will echo their head ball coach Huesman, who said of Tull, "We were just so lucky to have him in this program."
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.