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The college football world is reacting to a court ruling that allowed Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Sorsby to return to the field this season – despite evidence that he placed thousands of bets over multiple years, including on his own team.
A local judge granted Sorsby a temporary injunction, limiting his punishment to missing just the Red Raiders’ first two games, against Abilene Christian and Oregon State. After that, he’s back under center.
The response from programs across the country has been swift. Several have announced they won’t schedule competitions against Texas Tech in any sport.
But it’s one anonymous Big 12 coach’s reaction that cuts to the heart of what this ruling actually means.
A Coach’s Blunt Take on the Sorsby Ruling
ESPN‘s Dan Wetzel spoke with multiple coaches to get their read on the situation. All of them were baffled. One Big 12 coach, speaking anonymously, offered what may have been a sarcastic – but pointed – response about what this precedent means for how he’ll handle his players going forward.
“If this is the precedent, then I owe it to my players to bring in people from Las Vegas to teach us how to gamble. Then collectively, we need to decide which games we will play hard in and which ones we won’t. I’m supposed to do what’s best for my players, and in that case, they would be able to make a lot of money betting on our games. That’s the precedent for me.”
It sounds absurd. It’s also a completely logical conclusion.
If a coach’s responsibility is to act in his players’ best interests, and the worst-case legal outcome for betting on your own games is sitting out two non-conference openers – why wouldn’t that calculus change? The coach isn’t wrong to ask the question, even if the answer is uncomfortable.
What This Ruling Actually Does to College Sports
Sorsby, by all appearances, bet on games for years, including games involving his own team. The punishment he’s facing is missing two contests that carry little weight in the broader season picture. That’s it.
Without real consequences for betting on games, the integrity of the sport itself becomes hard to defend. The Sorsby ruling – handed down by a local judge with apparent sympathies toward the home team – has given college football a legitimacy problem it won’t easily shake.
