ESPN’s Josh Pate: Texas Tech Should’ve Kept Quiet after Sorsby Reinstatement

Josh Pate thought Texas Tech had one shrewd move available after Brendan Sorsby won his ruling to play: shut up. They did the opposite, and Pate believes it's a big reason the whole thing collapsed within days.

When the injunction came down and Sorsby looked highly likely to play, Pate's read was that Texas Tech should have said nothing. The vast majority of the college football public, and society at large, viewed the decision as wrong, a loophole rather than justice, and nothing the school said was going to move opinion their way. Instead, Texas Tech released a 22-minute video featuring five people, some of whom Pate knows well and considers great, who were largely telling the truth. It didn't matter. The optics buried it. Nobody bothered to watch. The public just saw a school that got its way now trying to explain why that was a good thing.

The second turning point was legal. When Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sent his letter on Texas Tech's behalf, Pate said it opened a whole new can of worms, handing the Big 12 and its other member schools the legal recourse to return the serve. Within 24 hours, the dam broke, and it became clear Texas Tech was fighting a losing battle.

Pate framed Sorsby declaring for the supplemental draft as best for all parties. You can never prove a counterfactual, but it doesn't take much imagination to picture how ugly Big 12 media days and the lead-up to week one would have been, with people in rival states chasing injunctions and headlines every time Texas Tech came to town. Removing that, he said, is a net win, and for Texas Tech specifically there were lessons. In a crisis, an organization wants a single, united voice, and instead there were three or four voices coming out of Lubbock.

Rich pushed the conversation toward the human cost. A 22-year-old quarterback should be wrestling with the pressure of playing the position, he said, not serving as the avatar for everything wrong in college athletics, which is what Sorsby became. He asked whether anyone actually knows how Sorsby is doing.

Pate didn't sugarcoat it. To his knowledge, Sorsby hasn't spoken publicly, and Pate hasn't talked to him or seen him around the building. He made an important point about the underlying reality. If the basis for all of this is a gambling addiction, and Pate believes it is authentic, then that reality doesn't disappear just because the eligibility fight is over. Addiction, whatever the form, has no off switch. Until Sorsby speaks and offers a full account, Pate said, how he's actually doing is anyone's guess.