With virtually the entire college football world out for Texas Tech’s blood over Brendan Sorsby — whom a judge inexplicably granted an injunction, allowing him to play this season despite having bet on his own team at a previous school — athletic director Kirby Hocutt penned an open letter Wednesday attempting to spin the program’s continued support for its transfer QB.
The CliffsNotes: We’re just looking out for this poor kid’s well-being as he recovers from his addiction.
“I’ve heard the word ‘integrity’ used a great deal in the last 48 hours,” Hocutt wrote. “… The integrity of sport matters. So does the integrity of how we treat a 22-year-old who sought help, entered residential treatment and is working every day toward recovery. Those two things don’t have to be in conflict.”
— Kirby Hocutt (@kirbyhocutt) June 10, 2026
The question Texas Tech’s leaders should be asking themselves right now is: Are we sure this is worth it? Are we sure we want to become the pariahs of college sports over a talented but troubled quarterback who’s not exactly the second coming of Patrick Mahomes? (Sorsby went 0-8 in November games the past two years at Cincinnati.)
Because doubling and tripling down on this insulting narrative that they’re just nobly helping a troubled kid with his addiction recovery — not that they’re still on the hook for his $4 million-plus contract and that they need him to win a championship — is only making people madder by the minute.
And this continued crusade could have far more damaging consequences for their university than playing their backup quarterback.
It’s telling that in the immediate aftermath of Monday’s bizarre court ruling, College Sports Inc. turned its fury not toward the judge who issued it but toward Texas Tech itself. This was its breaking point after two years of resentment toward the school, though mainly its board chair/billionaire Cody Campbell, for trying to buy his alma mater a championship, rules be damned, while simultaneously shouting, “The system is broken!”
Big 12 football coaches were lashing out about Texas Tech before the Red Raiders’ 2025 conference championship even began. Nonconference softball coaches were refusing to play Texas Tech before it was cool.
But irking jealous opposing coaches with a little tampering is one thing. Making a mockery of the most dangerous act affecting the integrity of competitions is a great way to tick off everyone from Hocutt’s fellow Big 12 ADs to their counterparts in other conferences to Power 4 commissioners to the president of the NCAA.
Again: Is this really worth it?
Who knows whether fellow Big 12 schools will actually follow through on their thus-far anonymous threats to forfeit games if Tech suits up Sorsby or if there will be attempts to excommunicate Tech from the conference? A defiant Campbell has already threatened to sue the Big 12’s brains out if it attempts to gang up on the school.
I’d be less concerned about ticking off the Big 12 than the Big Ten and SEC.
Campbell’s entire political crusade is about ensuring Tech doesn’t get left behind in whatever the next iteration of college athletics is. At the heart of the new Protect College Sports Act in the Senate — which Campbell was heavily involved in crafting — are two of his pet causes: 1) allowing conferences to consolidate their media rights into one NFL-like contract so they can all make more money, and 2) preventing the SEC and Big Ten from breaking away to form their own Super League.
But if a Super League does come one day, Texas Tech would presumably want to be included. This is why it’s paramount it starts turning its long-irrelevant football program into a national powerhouse to make it more attractive to the big boys.
But if Tech keeps on its current path, there’s little chance the likes of Ohio State, Michigan, Georgia and Alabama will ever want to be associated with it. Why would they invite a rogue actor with no regard for even the most basic rules into their club?
At least national championship programs such as Florida State and Clemson had some leverage when they sued their own conference, the ACC. If the Big 12 gave Texas Tech the boot tomorrow, the league’s media value would decrease by 0.0 percent. The conference already has three other schools in Texas, including two of the top-six TV markets in the country (TCU in Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston).
Lubbock is No. 140. One behind Medford-Klamath Falls in southern Oregon.
Meanwhile, newfound D.C. power broker Campbell is doing no favors to his favorite senators, Ted Cruz and Maria Cantwell. They need 60 votes to pass his coveted bill. What’s a great way to lose votes? Mock Georgia over its reckless driving arrests in a clumsy attempt at “Hey, you think we’re bad? Look at those guys.” Tick off the most important institution in Nebraska to the point that it refuses to play you. The politicians in those states will always side with their universities over yours.
@grok, how many @GeorgiaFootball players have been arrested in the last year?https://t.co/WFPehoVhgN
— Cody Campbell (@CodyC64) June 8, 2026
But suppose we suspend disbelief for a second and take Hocutt at his word — that this whole thing is solely about helping out one of its athletes in a time of need.
There are any number of things the school could do to support his recovery — honoring his scholarship, setting him up with the best doctors and counselors — that do not include letting a guy who violated the cardinal sin of sports be their starting quarterback.
We know that’s not Tech’s true motive. The real tragedy in its eyes would be to get stuck paying a guy more than $4 million not to play for the team and wind up going 7-5 without him.
What Texas Tech doesn’t seem to realize — or maybe does, but doesn’t care — is that alienating their entire industry and endangering their school’s athletics future would be an infinitely greater cost.