Brendan Sorsby Suspended...Finished At Texas Tech? - Josh Pate Reaction

0:00 All right, the Brendan Sorsby Texas Tech stuff has

0:02 broken since the last time we had a show.

0:04 So, to get everyone up to speed, which you probably already are,

0:07 there is an NCAA investigation underway

0:09 into gambling related matters with Brendan Sorsby.

0:13 Brendan Sorsby was the starting quarterback at Cincinnati last year.

0:16 He transferred to Texas Tech.

0:18 Huge NIL deal, several million dollars.

0:22 And now, this is from Pete Nikos over at onthree.com.

0:26 And you can I'll read it.

0:28 You know what?

0:28 I'll read part of it.

0:29 With the NCAA investigation underway,

0:31 sources told on three that Sorsby is expected to write

0:34 a letter to the NCAA in the near future explaining this situation.

0:38 NCAA rules state that if a player bets on their own sport at another school,

0:42 the player could lose 50% of one season of eligibility.

0:46 The player also may receive education on sports

0:49 wagering and rules and prevention in that case.

0:51 It goes on to basically talk about what he did

0:54 and allegedly what he did was when he was in Indiana way

0:58 back in the day 2022 he was on the team and bet

1:03 on Indiana games at least in one instance if not more.

1:07 I haven't seen his account information personally also

1:09 I question how that happens but I digress.

1:12 So if that's happening obviously it's going to be a big problem.

1:17 uh my feel on this and I have no

1:19 information above and beyond what Pete's talked about here.

1:22 I've listened to them talk about it.

1:24 I've listened to, you know, a couple of people who cover this stuff

1:27 and who cover NCAA related matters pretty closely.

1:31 Their feel is that he's unlikely to play this year.

1:35 I'm going to agree with them.

1:37 My feel is that he's unlikely to play this year.

1:40 Now, I'm going to take a very pessimistic

1:42 approach on that and kind of hope I'm wrong.

1:45 Uh, but my feel is I'm getting ready to watch Texas

1:49 Tech without Brendan Sorsby this year and then what does he do?

1:52 Does he go in the supplemental draft?

1:54 Does he sit out a year and then get ready

1:56 for next year's draft which is loaded at the quarterback position?

2:00 But that's down the road.

2:01 Okay, so there are really two matters in play here.

2:04 Let me address the less serious matter first,

2:07 and that's the on the- field part for Texas Tech this year.

2:11 There is no backup option here.

2:14 There's a literal backup.

2:15 His name is Will Hammond who has started before who is not a bad player.

2:19 They had to use him last year.

2:21 He was pressed into duty last year.

2:23 He's 6'3.

2:24 He's 205.

2:25 He's a red shirt sophomore.

2:27 He was a top 200 prospect in a couple of cycles ago in recruiting.

2:31 So, he's not a bad player.

2:33 It's just that I think most people's feel on Texas Tech's top

2:37 end potential with Will Hammond is

2:39 beneath that of winning a national championship.

2:42 Now, they may very well still be the best team

2:44 in the Big 12 if I had to pick the Big 12 today.

2:48 Like, I would still probably pick Texas Tech to win it,

2:51 even if Will Hammond has to be my wire-to-wire quarterback.

2:55 It's bigger than that, though.

2:57 You I think the number six million or so, Jesse.

3:00 I mean, you invested about $6 million into Brennan

3:04 Sorsby being the guy that could take you further.

3:06 And then you went last year.

3:08 And where you went last year is in a you

3:11 drove into a brick wall basically in the playoffs

3:13 because Baron Morton and what you had offensively last

3:16 year was not good enough to get past an Oregon.

3:18 Good enough to win the Big 12, not good enough to do anything beyond that.

3:22 And they knew that and they thought they had addressed it.

3:24 They had addressed it at quarterback and then this pops up.

3:28 Okay, there's no spring portal window now.

3:30 There is no get done with spring ball

3:33 and then this kind of story pops up and okay, we can go bail ourselves out.

3:38 we can go offer like Austin Mack at Alabama.

3:40 We can go offer a backup somewhere or maybe

3:42 like a G5 level starter to bail us out.

3:45 There is none of that.

3:47 So unless people are wrong and the ghost portal

3:50 theory is in play and that's the thing where you

3:53 get a guy to just unenroll somewhere and enroll

3:56 on your campus and dare the NCAA to enforce their rules.

4:00 Short of that happening and short of us being wrong about Brennan

4:04 Sorsby here and he's just cleared short of one of those things happening,

4:07 it's Will Hammond this year, which makes Texas Tech still a good team,

4:12 but probably beneath that of a national championship contender.

4:15 So, we'll await more word on that.

4:17 Then there's the other part.

4:19 This is the more serious part.

4:21 I've noticed people trying to create a lot of gray area here.

4:24 You know, people talking about, well, is it really that bad?

4:27 Well, you know, a lot of times out there,

4:30 I'm watching a college football game and they're

4:32 gambling related advertising all over the place

4:34 and these leagues are making money off

4:37 of gambling related deals with these sports books.

4:40 And is it so wrong for a player to bet on the gifts?

4:43 Absolutely it is.

4:44 There's no gray area here at all.

4:46 It's very, very cut and dry.

4:49 It's black and white.

4:49 There not shades of gray here.

4:51 There's shades of gray in other areas I'll talk about in a second.

4:54 But if you bet on the sport you're playing,

4:55 specifically if you bet on games that you are playing in, you're done.

5:01 Hey, do me one favor right here.

5:02 Look down.

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5:11 All right, that's it for me.

5:12 Back to the clip.

5:13 That's it.

5:14 Case closed on that.

5:15 Uh it's not hypocritical one iota for the league you play

5:20 in or even the team you play for to be accepting advertising dollars,

5:25 but especially if you're games are being broadcast on ESPN

5:29 or Fox and they're accepting money in advertising dollars from sports books,

5:35 but yet you're being asked not to bet on the games.

5:38 No, it's not hypocritical.

5:39 That's fortune cookie logic.

5:41 Does it create a bad vibe?

5:44 Do you not love the optics of it?

5:45 That's fine.

5:46 That's fine.

5:47 I'll agree with you there.

5:49 The stuff's plastered all over the place in games

5:51 and yet at the first whiff of any impropriy,

5:55 you want to toss a kid on the scrap heap.

5:57 I could word it just as unfavorably as you can.

6:00 So, yeah, the optics don't feel great,

6:03 but I'm not really about the optics or feelings.

6:05 I'm about the, you know, the reality of the matter.

6:08 The reality of the matter is, no, you can't do this stuff.

6:11 And if you do it, you're done.

6:13 You're ineligible.

6:14 You should be ineligible.

6:15 You can't mess around with that stuff.

6:17 Now, for the broader conversation that for some

6:20 reason people thought I'd shy away from.

6:21 I couldn't care less about talking about this.

6:24 FanDuel is the presenting odds partner of this show.

6:28 We infuse FanDuel all throughout this show.

6:30 I've left it out of this segment for obvious reasons,

6:33 but I want to be fully fully transparent here.

6:36 Uh we have a significant partnership with FanDuel.

6:40 they are a significant partner of this show.

6:42 So the broader conversation happening out there is

6:45 around sports betting as a whole, as an entity.

6:50 You've got a very extreme group that would say,

6:53 "Well, we just think sports betting should be illegal." Okay.

6:56 Well, obviously it's not.

6:58 Then you've got another group that says, "We know sports betting exists.

7:03 We just wish that it wasn't so synonymous

7:07 with the coverage and the games." In other words,

7:09 that's the kind of person who says, "I wish I could watch games without having

7:13 it constantly thrown in my face." Totally fair take.

7:16 Totally fair.

7:18 That's that's your preference now.

7:20 So, just let's acknowledge there's a big difference in one's

7:24 preference versus what you feel should be legal or illegal.

7:29 Like, I'm not the biggest fan of hip-hop.

7:31 I'm not going to call for it to be illegal, you know?

7:33 So, my preference versus what I think should and shouldn't be allowed,

7:36 two different things.

7:37 Okay.

7:38 So, here was what was going to happen.

7:41 When sports betting was legalized across the country,

7:44 a lot of people said, "Boy,

7:46 it's an inevitability that eventually someone's going to get

7:48 caught up in a scandal." And you know what?

7:50 They were right.

7:52 And then, you know what my followup is?

7:54 Okay.

7:55 Okay.

7:56 Uh, freedom of choice, freedom in general, it's just not going to be clean.

8:02 Doesn't mean something should be outlawed.

8:04 Uh now if you want to take a personal stance on things that's fine.

8:08 You'll notice as an example we practice that around here.

8:12 There has never been a dime of alcohol-based advertising accepted on this show.

8:17 We leave millions of dollars on the table per year from alcohol companies,

8:23 beer companies because I don't want it on our show.

8:26 It's not the lifestyle I live.

8:27 It's personal preference.

8:29 I don't I don't hop up on a high horse and talk about it.

8:31 In fact, I don't think I've ever talked about it on air until right now.

8:34 And that's merely to make a point.

8:36 That's my personal preference.

8:37 I'm not going to take the added step of shaming

8:40 anyone else if they do accept alcohol-related advertising dollars.

8:45 And I'm not going to say that alcohol-related advertising should be outlawed,

8:49 even though I personally don't like it.

8:51 And so when it comes to sports betting,

8:54 I understand that there is a little different tone there

8:57 because what you're talking about is subject matter and advertising

9:00 dollars tied to something that's directly related to the play

9:05 on the field and therefore it could compromise integrity of game.

9:10 Well, here's what you do.

9:11 Here's what you do.

9:12 It's very simple.

9:14 You go overboard in educating participants, both coaches, players,

9:19 and staffers in that world about the consequences

9:24 of sacrificing the integrity of the game.

9:26 And then you punish them if they do it.

9:28 And you leave no gray area.

9:30 You do not mince words.

9:32 You speak really, really in a threatening tone because it is that.

9:37 And you let them know there is zero tolerance for this.

9:40 This is the tradeoff to be a college athlete.

9:42 This is the trade-off to be a pro alete.

9:44 This is the trade-off to be a coach here.

9:47 This is the trade-off if you want to work

9:49 in the recruiting staff or the marketing staff.

9:51 If you have access to this program,

9:54 there's going to be a zero tolerance policy on betting on this stuff.

9:58 You cannot do it.

9:59 If that's a problem for you, then move along.

10:03 There's no place for you here.

10:04 That's it.

10:05 And that's all.

10:07 Was it an inevitability that a player was

10:09 eventually going to get caught up in this?

10:12 Yes, just law of mathematics.

10:14 Yes, that was always going to be part of the territory.

10:20 That was always going to come with the territory of legalizing sports betting.

10:24 That doesn't mean it was wrong to do it is my point.

10:27 That doesn't mean it's wrong for it to exist.

10:29 Even as you and I can have differences of opinions in how

10:32 much it should be proliferated throughout the industry of game broadcasts,

10:36 throughout the industry of commentary, including mine,

10:39 FanDuel is a partner of mine.

10:40 They've been a wonderful partner of mine.

10:43 I don't apologize for any of that.

10:47 And at the same time, I'm fully capable of looking at the situation and saying,

10:52 "All right, so he did something allegedly he shouldn't have done.

10:55 He's going to be punished for it.

10:56 If the allegations are true, he should be punished for it.

11:00 I don't feel great about it.

11:02 I do feel it's the right decision.

11:04 I also don't feel that it's caused to take the edge

11:09 of sketch button and wipe the entire slate clean because someone did

11:13 something that they weren't supposed to do that they knew they

11:16 weren't supposed to do then we should upturn the entire ecosystem here.

11:20 No.

11:20 No, I don't think that's the answer.

11:23 I don't think that's the road we should go down.