Florida Gators history could be much different if they had Brendan Sorsby’s judge
The landmark ruling on Monday morning granted Texas Tech QB Brendan Sorsby an injunction, somthing they could have used in 2015.
The Texas Tech Red Raiders got massive news on Monday morning when quarterback Brendan Sorsby was given an injunction, allowing him to play during the 2026 season. He had been previously suspended for the season due to gambling.
It’s a wild decision that has many across the world of college football struggling to understand both why this would happen and how it changes the sport forever. No matter how you parse it out, Sorsby blatantly broke the rules when it comes to gambling. He earned the suspension, and taking it to the court system, the same pathway Diego Pavia did with his junior college stint.
Jim McElwain’s Florida Gators tenure could have been way different
Players having success with the legal system creates an interesting element that we haven’t had before. It could be the end of college football as we know it, but we’ve said that a dozen times before.
One instance where the Gators could have benefited from an injunction was in 2015 when redshirt freshman Will Grier was emerging as the next star quarterback for the Gators. He found Antonio Callaway on a fourth and 14 late in the game to beat Tennessee 28-27.
Two weeks later, Grier was suspended for a calendar year after failing a test for performance-enhancing substances. He took an over-the-counter supplement that had a banned ingredient, and it cost him both the rest of a promising 2015 season and prompted his transfer to West Virginia.
Up to that point, the Gators were undefeated at 6-0 and had smoked the No. 3-ranked Ole Miss Rebels 38-10. Treon Harris stepped in at quarterback the next week, as the Gators barely lost to the LSU Tigers 35-28, and were 10-1 before losing the final three games of the season, including a 41-7 loss to Michigan in the Capital One Bowl.
If the Gators got an injunction in the same way that Sorsby did for Grier, they could have competed for a national championship. Should they have been allowed to do that? It’s an entirely different discussion, but in that “what if” world, we may be looking at a much different Gators football program.