Wait so ESPN drops their Big 12 preview and the whole thing is just a coronattion for Texas Tech because of this Sorsby mess they got going on. We are an afterthought in our own league according to the national folks. I keep thinking back to the 1998 Sun Bowl season when nobody gave us a chance either and Dennis Franchione had those boys believing in something bigger than what the magazines said. We went down to Lubbock that year and ran the ball right down their throats in the fourth quarter when it mattered most. That was football played by men who had been in the program for three and four years, not guys jumping from school to school every December.
You look at this roster we are building now and I cannot tell you who is gonna be here in August. The spring window is gone now which is something I actually agree with but the winter window still turns everything into a free agent frenzy. Kids are leaving because the NIL deal across town is fifty bucks more and we are supposed to get excited about summer workouts and team chemistry. I remember when we had walk ons who would bleed purple for four years just to get a helmet sticker and a pat on the back from the position coach. Now every time I see a depth chart I need a scorecard to know who is still on the team.
The 2005 squad that went 11-1 had guys who came back for their senior seasons because they loved this program and this town. LaDainian Tomlinson was before my time watching live but I heard the stories from my buddies who were in the stands. That kind of loyalty does not exist anymore. We are sitting here in April with the NFL Draft going on and half our production from last year is either gone to the league or scattered across the transfer portal to twenty different schools. ESPN puts us in the middle of the Big 12 pack and honestly I cannot argue with them when I do not even know who our starting quarterback is gonna be come September.
The old days are gone and this Sorsby thing just proves it. One quarterback gets a favorable ruling and suddenly the whole conference pecking order shifts because of lawyers and NIL collectives instead of what happens between the hash marks. I will still be in the stands when they kick off against North Carolina this fall because that is what we do. But do not tell me this is the same sport I fell in love with back in the late seventies when I first walked into Amon Carter Stadium and felt something real.