Top prospect Cavan Sullivan will turn pro with the Union before joining Man City in a few years

Just when it seemed like the Union were doomed to lose it all with Cavan Sullivan, the best prospect in team history, they seem to have pulled off a miracle.

Sullivan, 14, will begin his pro career with the Union, a source confirmed to The Inquirer on Wednesday after The Athletic first reported it. He will join Manchester City in a few years, with the English superpower paying a transfer fee for him.

There are no formal contracts in place yet with the Sullivan family or Manchester City, the source said, but they are in progress and are expected to be completed.

It’s a stunning turn of events, after many signs over the last few months that Sullivan would spurn the club where he has grown up and go straight to City’s global network of clubs when he turns 16.

Sullivan’s deal is expected to be the richest for any MLS academy product in league history. It’s not yet known exactly what the offer is, but earlier this month, a source with knowledge of the matter told The Inquirer that the Union made such an offer and Sullivan’s camp turned it down.

As of now, the record belongs to the New York Red Bulls’ Julian Hall, who just turned 16. He earned $167,685 last season, according to the MLS Players Association, to start a 3½-year contract.

Sullivan’s deal will make him eligible for the Union’s first team. The Athletic said that if he really takes off and is ready to move on from MLS at 16, the Union and City Football Group will move him to one of its European Union teams where he can play.

» READ MORE: Cavan Sullivan, 14, debuts for the Union’s reserve team with a game-winning assist

Because Sullivan has a German passport through his mother’s ancestry, he can play professionally in any European Union country at 16. He can’t play in England until he’s 18 because it’s not part of the EU.

While much of the soccer world cared more about Manchester City’s side of the deal, around here the Union’s side matters just as much. It would have been a huge black eye for the team if Sullivan hadn’t agreed to turn pro here.

In the short term, the Union would have missed out on the many millions of dollars they’ll get from selling him. In the long term, the even bigger sums the team spends on developing top young talent would go up in flames. Every major prospect in the pipeline would immediately have the leverage to blow the team off and leave for nothing.

Similar scenarios could have played out at other MLS teams, too, with high-profile prospects who would feel empowered to blow off their local clubs instead of encouraged to help them grow.

And in Sullivan’s case, the tangles are even deeper. His brother Quinn is finally a regular player with the Union’s first team this season. Their father, Brendan, is a history teacher at the high school the Union run for their elite prospects, and Brendan and his father, Larry, were Union manager Jim Curtin’s college coaches at Villanova.

» READ MORE: Quinn Sullivan shines for the Union while younger brother Cavan commands headlines

Jim’s brother Jeff Curtin was also Quinn and Cavan Sullivan’s agent for a time, until the brothers left for a bigger agency, Wasserman.

Cavan made his debut for the Union’s reserve team as an amateur on Sunday, delivering the game-winning assist as a second-half substitute. Quinn has played in every game for the first team this year, with two goals and two assists.

Getting Cavan to start his pro career here instead of in Manchester isn’t the same thing as winning the trophies that Union fans covet. But when it comes to the team’s long-term reputation, it could be just as big.