Texas Tech Transfer QB Brendan Sorsby Leaves School, Enters Gambling Rehab

Smart money says that sports gambling scandals will be more dog-licks-man than man-bites-dog real soon. But for now, this rates as big college football news: Texas Tech announced on Monday that quarterback Brendan Sorsby has left the program to get treated for a gambling addiction.

The Lubbock Avalanche-Journal reported that Sorsby, who transferred to the Red Raiders in January after two years at Cincinnati, will enter a residential rehab facility. According to the school, the length of his stay at the treatment center is “indefinite.”

“We love Brendan and support his decision to seek professional help,” Texas Tech head coach Joey McGuire said, in a statement released by the school. “Taking this step requires courage, and our primary focus is on him as a person.”

ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported that Sorsby is being investigated by the NCAA, and his departure “came in the wake of the discovery of Sorsby making thousands of online bets on a variety of sports via a gambling app.” Sources also told Thamel that Sorsby was known to have bet on Indiana football in 2022, a season in which he was on the Hoosiers roster but played in just one game before declaring as a redshirt. On3 reported that Sorsby was also known to have bet on "balls and strikes" for Cincinnati Reds games.

Sorsby was seen as a big catch for the Lubbock school, where big catches have become commonplace since billionaire alum Cody Campbell started throwing his oil money around. Campbell, who played offensive line for the Red Raiders around the turn of the century, opened his wallet and got other alums to join him in the talent acquisition Wild West that is college athletics circa 2026. The resulting windfall of NIL payouts has turned Tech into a national championship contender in all sorts of sports—even softball, where Campbell et al made NiJaree Canady the first million-dollar arm in the sport, and an appearance in the title round of the 2025 College World Series promptly followed.

The biggest pile of Campbell’s petrodollars, of course, is directed toward the football team. Not coincidentally, the Red Raiders went into the 2026 College Football Playoff as the No. 4 seed, largely on the play of quarterback Behren Morton, who spent his entire collegiate career at Texas Tech. Though he performed poorly in a 23-0 loss to Oregon on New Year's Day, he still went down as one of the best Red Raiders quarterbacks in recent memory, and ended up as a seventh-round pick by the New England Patriots at the NFL Draft this past weekend.

Whatever worries there were about filling Morton's cleats went away quickly when Sorsby declared he was leaving Cincinnati for the godforsaken hub of the South Plains, less than a week after the Red Raiders’ playoff exit. Sorsby’s deal was worth a reported $5 million. Sorsby’s old workplace didn’t take the departure well: Cincinnati sued Sorsby in federal court for $1 million, alleging his move to the Red Raiders violated the NIL pact he had with the Bearcats. That suit remains pending, and no word yet on how Sorsby’s leave of absence for treatment will impact his Tech salary. Early reviews at his new place of employment had been promising: Sorsby threw for four touchdowns earlier this month in the team's annual spring game.

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