Arguably the biggest story of the offseason across all levels of football is about an ineligible college quarterback with spotty amateur credentials who may or may not become the first NFL supplemental draft pick in seven years.
And, apparently, the whole NFL is at least considering getting in on the action.
According to Pete Thamel, college sports insider for ESPN, all 32 teams are expected to be at Brendan Sorsby’s pro day workout on July 10. Obviously, that includes the Los Angeles Rams.
This is one of the more unique and litigious football stories in recent years. All the details have been fully accounted elsewhere, but in brief, in case you’ve missed it: Brendan Sorsby started his career at Indiana before transferring to Cincinnati and then Texas Tech. He has been caught wagering upwards of $90,000 on sports, including bets involving his own team while at Indiana. Facing a ban from the NCAA, he sued the organization to stay eligible and got an injunction from a local judge that would have allowed him to play most of 2026. However, after mounting legal pressure from the Big 12 Conference (and college sports at large), Sorsby is leaving Texas Tech and dropping his court case.
After not playing a single snap for the Red Raiders, he now plans to enter the NFL’s supplemental draft, which hasn’t been held since 2023 and hasn’t seen a player selected since 2019.
There is a ton of hype surrounding Sorbsy in football media right now, and obviously that has permeated the league itself if Thamel is correct that every NFL team is expected to be at his workout. But for the Rams specifically, if not for plenty of the 32 teams, it’s hard to argue that the juice is worth the squeeze here.
To be frank, it would be shocking if the Rams made a bid for Sorsby. Positionally, the Rams already have their nailed-on starter in Matthew Stafford, the hopeful quarterback of the future in 2026 first rounder Ty Simpson and another veteran battling for the backup job this season in Stetson Bennett. Unless the franchise is ready to move on from Bennett and wants to take two shots at finding Stafford’s successor at once, there’s just no room for Sorsby.
Plus, the draft capital cost is too rich for a project quarterback considering how little the Rams have for 2027. The supplemental draft features a blind bidding process with the player awarded to the team that bids the highest pick. If a team drafts a player in the supplemental draft, he replaces the corresponding draft pick in the following regular draft. For example: If a team bids a second-round pick and that’s the high bid, that team gets the player and he replaces their second-round pick in the next draft.
Los Angeles already only has four picks in their possession for 2027, with the Cleveland Browns, Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers (by way of the Baltimore Ravens) owning their first, third and seventh-round selections thanks to trades. It doesn’t make a ton of sense to risk spending some of that limited capital on a project quarterback that would only muddy the waters of that position group more.
Complicating matters for Sorsby in general is that there’s no consensus on how good of a prospect he actually is. As far as draft analysts go, Dane Brugler of The Athletic said on a recent episode of The Athletic Football Show that he’s mostly heard that teams are giving third-round grades to Sorsby and some thought he could have gone in the second round of notoriously QB-bereft 2026 draft.
Nate Tice of Yahoo Sports, meanwhile, said on an episode of Football 301 earlier this offseason that he felt Sorsby was more of a fourth-round talent who would go later in a supplemental draft, even before considering the dark gambling-related cloud over him.
He’s toolsy, but a project. He’s got legitimate off-field concerns. He played in an offense at Cincinnati that can hardly be described as “pro style.” That’s a risky proposition in a supplemental draft when you don’t get the same kind of facetime and evaluation time that you get in the regular draft.
Every team is apparently going to see him put on one last showcase before the supplemental draft. That doesn’t mean Sorsby makes sense for all of them, or even for most of them. The Rams certainly fall into that category.
