nick in portland 🌵

He did do something. Enough to warrant USA Today to write an article about how jerky the @Big12Conference commissioner acted. usatoday.com/story/sports/nc…

So the @Big12Conference continues to do things that undercut it's already P4-worst revenues. Cutting the fines for skipping bowls -- something that hits the bottom line of all their schools and will only incentivize more to do it -- as they continue to sue Tx Tech for doing something they never actually did (play Brendan Sorsby) and trying to stick them with the legal fees despite fellow league member Cincinnati having actually played Sorsby the last two years knowing all about his gambling issues (according to USA today and Sorby's agent). Usually conference favoritism goes towards the biggest brands that have the ability to help bring additional revenue to the league instead of the bottom feeders, but not in the Big 12 apparently. The have-nots and the bitterness they have toward the biggest 'have' clearly rule the league. A few years from now when more realignment happens and this league falls to Pac 12 status maybe they'll start to understand the importance of maximizing revenue.

I'm fascinated by the pettiness that is the @Big12Conference . When I was living in my home state of Michigan developing my love of college sports as part of my school newspaper staff my knowledge of Tx Tech didn't extend much past Michael Crabtree's catch and their quirky coach. But since moving to Texas I've learned a lot more. I've enjoyed following and, yes, defending them from all the virtue-signaling hypocrites who have attacked them over pulling an SEC and getting an injunction to sidetrack NCAA ineligibility. I'll go to my grave believing that if Sorsby had chosen LSU over TT we'd have heard a lot less about it and Sorsby would be suiting up this fall in Baton Rouge. A big part of the difference is the SEC supports it's own. They've had seemingly countless injunctions in that league yet those schools don't openly criticize each other. They may hate each other behind closed doors, but if that's the case we'll never hear about it in public. The Big 12, on the other hand, had bitter coaches and athletic directors who couldn't wait to find someone in the media to talk about internal meetings about TT and their outrage that TT would dare consider playing it's $5M portal QB after a judge made him eligible. And now we're finding out more and more about Cincinnati doing EXACTLY what the others were accusing TT of wanting to do -- knowingly playing a QB who gambled on his own team. Except Cincy tried to sweep it under the carpet despite being notified in 2024 according to USA Today and Sorsby's agent. Yet there is no outrage for the Bearkats from TCU's Sonny Dykes, or Kansas State's foul-mouthed Gene Taylor, or any of the others who were so outraged at TT. And ever the hypocrite, Cincy even had the gall to vote for sanctioning TT. There's some indication that behind the scenes only Oklahoma State was supporting TT for doing what 99% of the other universities in the country would do under the same circumstances. That makes sense to me because at the end of the day TT and OSU are probably the most valuable athletic departments and the natural candidates to fill the void left by Texas and Oklahoma. So why is the Big 12 so petty compared to the SEC when it comes to having each other's backs? My guess is the Big 12 is full of have-nots who are extremely insecure at the thought of anyone becoming the 900 lbs gorilla that TT has quickly become. In the SEC, much like the Big Ten, there are a bunch of gorillas so everyone is pretty secure. But the Big 12 only has TT and not much else unless OSU returns to prominence or BYU continues breaking through on a regular basis. And the insecurity that comes from that fact means articles like the Iowa State write-up below are never going to defend the league heavyweight. They're just going to be petty, virtue-signaling, and bitter. I guess the moral of the story is that have-nots seem to only be happy with other have-nots.

Sanction them for what? Cincinnati playing Sorsby all last year while knowing about his problem? Or for maybe/potentially playing him sometime in the future? I've gone from lightly supporting these guys to firmly being in their corner after all the idiotic pearl clutching like this. One of the first things I learned in the very first foundational law class I ever took was you can't sue / sanction people for something they might do in the future. oklahoman.com/story/news/pol…