Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Sorsby is seeking an injunction to allow him to play for the Red Raiders this season. But the NCAA says it would then become the first major American sports league to allow the return of an athlete that placed bets on their own team’s games.
The recent court filings paint a more detailed picture of the scale of Sorsby’s sports betting history.
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They reveal that while he was a scout team and backup QB for the Indiana Hoosiers for his first two collegiate seasons, he placed 2,900 sports bets totaling more than $30,000.
40 of these bets were on games involving the Hoosiers, with all of them being placed on games that Sorsby did not make an appearance in.
The NCAA says that no performance manipulation took place and no inside information was used, but athletes are strictly prohibited from gambling on any NCAA-sanctioned sport.
Sorsby has since spent 35 days at a gambling rehabilitation center receiving treatment, something his attorneys noted in their filings.
While the NCAA has commended him for this, it also wrote that “the NCAA Bylaws are clear that his college football career has come to an end.”
Sorsby was reportedly diagnosed with gambling addiction and anxiety disorders while rehabbing and his attorneys are asking the NCAA to treat the QB’s situation as a mental health issue.
In response, the NCAA says allowing Sorsby to return would have a monumental impact on college sports.
“It would create unfair outcomes for the many student-athletes who have resisted the temptation to gamble, or who have gambled and been punished under the same rules Plaintiff now seeks to evade. … And it would undermine the integrity of college athletics by rewarding conduct that is universally prohibited in American sports.”
A hearing for Sorsby’s request is set for Monday, but this could easily become a drawn out legal battle.
James Parker is a sports writer for Ball Exclusives, follow him on X @TheJames_Parker
