About as soon as Texas Tech quarterback Brenden Sorsby was ruled ineligible for the 2026 season by the NCAA due to gambling violations, the Cleveland Browns were rumored as a potential suitor.
Sorsby’s legal team has since filed a lawsuit against the NCAA seeking an emergency injunction. The whole thing’s a giant mess — one a Browns team that already has enough issues in its quarterback room should want no part of.
The root of the speculation is the potential for Sorsby to enter the NFL’s supplemental draft, which hasn’t officially been scheduled in 2026 and isn’t even held every year. The last time a team bid a future pick on a player in a supplemental draft was in 2019.
If Sorsby remains ineligible to play college football this season, which seems likely after it was discovered he made thousands of online bets via a gambling app, his camp could apply for the NFL supplemental draft and wait on a decision from the league. If approved, he’d be the biggest name to become available in such a fashion since the Browns bid a second-round pick on wide receiver Josh Gordon in 2012.
FanSided’s Austen Bundy recently tabbed Cleveland as one of four NFL teams now in “supplemental draft mode” after the NCAA denied Sorsby’s reinstatement request, but aside from the Browns not having a clear-cut starter at quarterback right now, the logic doesn’t quite add up.
“Even with the team drafting Arkansas' Taylen Green, the worst Sorsby could do is wind up on Cleveland's practice squad and wait for the injury bug to do its thing,” Bundy wrote. “It's been quite a long time since a Browns passer has completed a full campaign without missing time for injury (Baker Mayfield, 2020). The team has also started at least three different QBs in each of the last three years. Something tells me Sorsby would get his chance in time.”
Hoarding another polarizing quarterback prospect is not the answer for the Browns
The Browns’ QB depth chart is currently four deep with Deshaun Watson and Shedeur Sanders battling at the top, and the returning Dillon Gabriel looking to fend off sixth-round rookie Taylen Green for the No. 3 spot. GM Andrew Berry hasn’t ruled out keeping all four quarterbacks this season, but after mapping out an early 53-man roster projection, three feels like the magic number.
Adding Sorsby to the mix this late in the process would only complicate matters even more.
First of all, the supplemental draft is a blind bidding process. The Browns would have to submit one of their 2027 draft picks to land Sorsby. They currently hold three fourth-round selections next year — their own, plus the Giants’ and Seahawks’ picks — so it’s not completely out of the question they submit a bid. But a fourth-round pick may not be enough. The only quarterback awarded in the last three-plus decades was Ohio State’s Terrell Pryor, who went to the Raiders for a third-round selection.
Even if the Browns love Sorsby as a prospect, he’s a 22-year-old who’s currently embroiled in a brutal off-field scandal. There’s no way to justify bidding a Day 2 pick in what’s expected to be a loaded 2027 draft class for him.
Bundy’s idea of potentially stashing Sorsby on the practice squad also isn’t feasible at all. The Browns would first have to release him, which would give all 31 teams an opportunity to claim him off waivers. Cleveland would essentially be lighting a premium 2027 draft pick on fire in that scenario.
There’s also this — the Browns just made Green the first QB drafted of the Todd Monken era, and Sanders has too much upside as a 2025 fifth-round pick to just dump for nothing. Watson’s locked onto the roster until the start of the 2027 league year due to his contract. Gabriel feels like the odd-man out ahead of training camp, but outside of an injury, adding Sorsby to the mix would essentially mean cutting ties with either Sanders or Green as well. That’s not happening.
It’s an interesting topic and the Browns are an obvious hypothetical suitor given their longstanding issues at the position. The speculation will only get crazier if Sorsby is officially granted entry by the NFL, which would have to come ahead of the league's June 22 application deadline.
But that’s all this really is — a hypothetical conversation during the NFL’s down season that, when you think about it, makes next to no sense for the Browns this year. They have enough polarizing quarterbacks already to get them through the 2026 season. If they do draft another quarterback, doing so in the actual draft, next April, is when they should do it.
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