Andrew Siciliano on NFL’s Stern Message in Denying Sorsby’s Supplemental Draft

No supplemental draft, everybody. Andrew Siciliano had flagged the possibility on Friday, and on Monday the NFL made it official, sending Brendan Sorsby a letter by certified mail that amounted to a firm and pointed no.

Siciliano laid out the league's logic on the show. The NFL has to grant a supplemental draft, and it rarely does. He asked the room to name the last player taken in one, and the answer was Jalen Thompson, a safety drafted by the Cardinals with a fifth-round pick, now signed to a free-agent deal with the Cowboys and still playing. By Siciliano's count, Thompson is the only active NFL player who entered the league through the supplemental route. There was a supplemental draft a couple of years back, he noted, and nobody got picked. These are not annual events, and even when they happen, there is no guarantee anyone hears their name.

The league's letter did not just decline. It scolded. Siciliano read from it, including the line that "participation in the NFL is a privilege that carries with it significant responsibilities, including accountability," and the closer encouraging Sorsby to prepare for possible entry through the 2027 draft. The substance underneath the politeness was blunt. Sorsby filed his petition three days before the deadline with no supporting documentation, and only after abandoning his litigation against NCAA sanctions. The league said the issues were too significant and too closely tied to its core integrity interests to review on that timeline.

That last part is the crux. As Siciliano walked through it, the NFL's position is essentially that Sorsby was declared ineligible by the NCAA, exhausted his college avenues, and now wants to play professionally, but his petition addressed none of the underlying matters. Public reporting indicates the NCAA's determination involved gambling, including wagers on his own team and teammates. The letter pointed out that Sorsby's filing demonstrated no accountability for any of it. In plainer terms, you ran from the NCAA's ruling, never argued your case, and showed up at the last minute expecting a yes.

Siciliano then mapped the legal road ahead. Sorsby has Jeffrey Kessler, a longtime NFL adversary from the labor side, as his attorney, and Kessler has already told ESPN the decision violates the collective bargaining agreement and the law and that he will pursue it with the players' association. The problem, Siciliano stressed, is that Sorsby is not a member of the union and is not an active player, so the CBA does not cover him. "Good luck with that," he said.

The bigger question is whether this becomes a real fight. The NFL retains sole discretion over supplemental drafts under the CBA, and many assumed the league would never open this Pandora's box precisely because Kessler was involved, with antitrust scrutiny already hanging over Washington. Siciliano made the human point too, noting he did not want to minimize Sorsby or the challenges he is facing. But the stakes are amplified because this is not a projected fifth-rounder. It is a quarterback once viewed as a potential first-round pick, the kind of money and talent that turns a procedural denial into a story.