College sports' immune system still works
Sort of, anyway. And much more in the latest Buzzer Mailbag!
Aw, yeah. Big ol’ mailbag incoming. Below you’ll find thoughts on the end of the Sorsby mess, the most underrated transfer of the 2026 portal, my least favorite college basketball arena, the way NIL deals are growing and how the NBA draft is changing, a search for a Bay Area team to get excited about, streaming services, whether the new Pac-12 is worth getting excited about, North Florida, academics, the World Cup, and so much more.
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OK, question time.
If you could only choose one thing to “fix” college basketball, what would that thing be? — Kyle
This is a convenient way in to this discussion, but it’s also just true: I want Brendan Sorsby to never happen again.
I want temporary injunctions gone. I want schools, coaches and players filing lawsuits to evade the application of simple, sensible NCAA rules — you can’t play if you’re not eligible; you can’t play if you have bet on your own sport, let alone your own team — to lose this exploit for good. I want a permanent injunction against temporary injunctions. I want it all to stop.
Otherwise, really, what is there to complain about? College basketball is better than at any point in my adult life. The product is incredible. The level is so high. Roster-building strategy and in-game tactics are more diverse and innovative than ever. Top players are staying in school; top international prospects are flooding in; talent is everywhere. I’ve never been particularly bothered by players making money, even lots of it, or transferring, even every year. NIL, for all of its weirdness, has mostly been a clever and effective quasi-workaround to the problem of revenue-sport athletes deserving to be paid handsomely and athletics departments needing to fund the crew team, too.
Plenty of fans’ mileage varies on this stuff, and I get it. Nothing’s perfect. But — for me — it’s better.
Nor do I mind the NCAA’s recent proposals on eligibility rules, even if this summer’s new international guidelines seem a little too strict at face value. The organization is doing its best in a challenging climate, and as long as the members all agree to a set of broadly reasonable rules, hey, fine.
Which is why the injunction madness drives me (and, far as I can tell, literally everyone else who likes college sports) completely insane. Charles Bediako was ineligible by NCAA rule. A random local judge told the NCAA “actually, um, I think your rules are wrong,” and so, just like that, Bediako got to play. Then another judge disagreed, and Bediako was immediately ineligible again. The latter decision was a relief — all’s well that ends well — but the entire spectacle should never have happened in the first place.
The Sorsby case was Bediako on steroids. This time, rather than some obscure, cheesecloth eligibility requirement, Sorsby had violated a fundamental, existential cardinal rule of all competitive athletics: You can’t gamble. No real league in any sport in any country in the world allows this. Nowhere does it go unpunished. No serious person believes that the legality of gambling or the existence of its advertisements are excuses for the participants to jeopardize the integrity of the competition. Sorsby obviously couldn’t play another season of college football. No right-thinking person could have disagreed.
But a judge did. One judge. One guy. That was all it took.
If there was any positive to come out of this mess, it was the speed and extent to which college athletics’ immune system attacked the Sorsby virus. The NCAA filed its own counter, of course. Schools and ADs across the country threatened to boycott Texas Tech. But the biggest move came from the 15 other members of the Big 12. Outraged, they refused to stand by Sorsby’s new benefactors (who grew more obviously desperate as the pressure mounted). Nor did they throw up their hands and play helpless when threatened by the Texas Attorney General. Rather, they enlisted prestigious firm Sidley Austin to seek a creative but apparently legally sound declaration that the league (duh) had to be able to enforce its own rules.
College sports lawyer Tom Mars — not exactly the NCAA’s greatest advocate down the years — summarized it colorfully:
One day later, Sorsby was expelled from the corpus. He entered the NFL supplemental draft. Tech turned tail. This was an encouraging end to the saga, in so far as it became clear that schools and leagues have ways to effect common sense beyond shrugging, rolling over and begging for Congress to put on a cape. Social pressure works. Ostracizing works. There are always levers to push.
Of course, this shouldn’t have to happen. Leagues waging legal holy war against their own rogue members every time a lower-court judge makes a wild decision — this is not sustainable. Dan Wetzel has it right: Instead of trying to roll a sweeping do-everything bill up a steep legislative hill, Congress could do the world of college sports much more good by keeping things simple:
College sports is now unable to determine who can play and for how long, or even whether it can enforce basic standards on the third-rail issues such as sports wagering.
There are currently multiple efforts in Congress designed to “save” college sports or “preserve” college sports. They are sprawling bills, complicated and filled with pet projects and straw man arguments. As such, none of them stand much of a chance.
As the battle for sweeping reform churns on, college sports needs to push for a so-called skinny bill designed to address the items that almost everyone agrees on: mainly eligibility and enforcement free from judicial interference.
Call it the Stop Suing the NCAA Over Dumb Shit Act of 2026. It could be like three sentences long.
It’s a pipe dream. But if I was granted the power to wave a wand and change one thing about college basketball, that would be it. No. More. Injunctions.
(Oh, and the NCAA Tournament. I’d make it 64 teams. Definitely not 76. And conference realignment: I’d rewind that by about 20 years, give or take. But yeah. Mostly it’s the injunctions.)
I know the dust still hasn’t completely settled yet from the portal and whatnot, and discussions about next season haven’t begun in earnest, but what transfer and/or returning player do you think wasn’t discussed enough or flew under the radar? — Ross
Maybe it’s just me, but I continued to be surprised by the relative dearth of information about, and apparent interest in, Robert Miller III. As I noted in the latest portal reactions update, Miller is the only player in Evan Miyakawa’s top 50 transfer prospects list still. That was nine days ago. It’s mid-June. Miller still hasn’t made a decision. What’s more, nobody seems to be tracking his recruitment (or lack thereof?) all that closely. Google News is eerily quiet.
The scuttlebutt has long suggested Miami is the likely destination, but why the delay? Why are there so few stories? Where are the tweets with graphics edits? Why aren’t the local message board site writers covering teams who still need functional big guys penning 500-word stories about Miller’s potential impact? This is the last top 50 player of the 2026 portal! And he’s a big! In 2026!
Weird.
Still, Miller isn’t the answer. Buzzer’s most underrated/under-discussed transfer of 2026 is … drum roll, please … and the award goes to …
… Connecticut center Najai Hines!
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