Texas Tech May Get Sorsby Back? New Report on What Cincinnati Knew

Brendan Sorsby’s NCAA gambling investigation may not be as simple as it looked a few days ago. After reports that Texas Tech could back Sorsby in a legal fight if the NCAA rules him permanently ineligible, there may now be a better chance he plays than many originally thought.

On tonight’s live show, we’re breaking down the latest on Sorsby’s case, the involvement of prominent sports lawyer Jeffrey Kessler, and whether this could become another major legal challenge to NCAA power. We’ll also dig into the latest reporting on what Cincinnati knew, what it didn’t know, and whether the Bearcats could face NCAA scrutiny of their own.

Plus, we’ll talk about Brett Yormark’s new private capital deal for the Big 12, why the RedBird partnership may matter more than the headline dollar figures, and how the Big Ten’s massive revenue numbers are changing the future of college sports.

Topics include Brendan Sorsby, Texas Tech football, Cincinnati football, NCAA gambling rules, Big 12 private capital, RedBird Capital, Brett Yormark, Big Ten revenue, SEC revenue, and the future of college football.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Well, we've got some updates on the Brendan Soresby situation, both on the Texas Tech and Soresby side of things and on the Cincinnati side of things. Cincy fans, pull up a seat. We do need to talk tonight. I got a little pushback on social media. This is honestly a place where I can say, hey, fair. I can understand some frustration. And it opens up just a, to me, a fascinating conversation about what the media is and how it serves everybody in the year 2026. Uh, a little sneaky update on this Soresby situation does make me think there is a chance that Brendan Soresby could actually play for Texas Tech this year, which is a little different than what I was thinking just moments ago. And when you saw I reacted initially to everything that happened within the past week. I also do, speaking of details that just slip through the cracks, a potential multi-million dollar per school massive thing that Brett Yormark did over the past week for the Big 12. This is where he excels. There are areas where I understand frustration with him. I think he may have hit an absolute home run here. And finally, speaking of home runs, boy, the Big Ten's finances. If you are managing the Big Ten's portfolio, if you are a Big Ten school, particularly Ohio State, man, life is good. And I've got some staggering, staggering data to prove that. Welcome into the Open for Business Big 12 podcast. I'm your host, John Kurtz. This is, of course, where the Big 12 just means more. Please do like and subscribe as you file in this morning. I this morning, this evening. I appreciate everybody who is here. Uh, we are we are heading toward 32,000 subscribers. We are heading toward 35,000. So please do give that a click and subscribe if you watch. Many of you do, but don't sub. It does help me quite a bit. If you do, make sure you're signed up for the Open for Business Big Twelve newsletter. It's OFBnews.com. That is OFBnews.com to get signed up for that. And thank you to everybody who does. All 6,300 plus of you who are subscribers. Twice a week, totally free, straight to your inbox. You can hit me up on John on uh Venmo at John Kurtz-4. If you're not watching this live, that is a great way to drop me a super chat. Get your question or comment in on the next show. I will get to it to kick off that next show if you do that. If you are so inclined here tonight, just fill up the chat. But if you want to guarantee that your question or comment gets on, click the dollar sign below the chat box. There's our housekeeping for the evening. I do want to give a special shout out as well, actually, to the audio-only audience. Uh, many of you have been watching on YouTube for a long time. I realized the other day I don't ever fully explain here to the audio-only audience, like, yeah, this is a YouTube live show, but obviously you can get the audio on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever it is that you get your podcast. And I genuinely appreciate all of you who do listen that way as well. Continue to spread the word there. Uh, if you subscribe to the YouTube channel, that's great. But just make sure you are subscribed to your audio platform where you're getting the show so you get every single episode when it drops. I'm getting better and better, I promise, about getting the audio up there for you. Uh, so let's continue to grow that. Let's let's continue taking this thing up and up and up. All right. Is Brendan Soresby actually going to play for Texas Tech this year? I'm now slightly more optimistic. And is the next massive legal attack on NCAA power coming via the Big 12 and Brendan Soresby? Some updates here on the Soresby situation we need to talk about. And I would summarize it all by the great Dumb and Dumber quote, right? One of the greatest movies of all time. So you're saying there's a chance. I'm going to tell you in this video what has changed, okay? So again, the quick cliff notes of the Brendan Soresby situation, that story, if you have not been paying attention over the last week. Brendan Soresby, caught gambling, NCAA is investigating. Soresby has entered a gambling treatment facility. Reports indicate it was over 10,000 bets made since at least 2022. One of those was a bet on his own team, which was at the time the Indiana Hoosiers. That's the one that most people feel was likely going to get him deemed permanently ineligible, much like Hunter Deckers at Iowa State a couple of years ago. Now, we had some reports that Texas Tech may back Brendan Soresby in an appeal and then legal push against the NCAA if they do rule him permanently ineligible. And we have conflicting reports on whether or not Cincinnati knew before playing him during the 2025 season. Okay, so that is where we were at before getting the update about what Soresby's plan is. This is really the first shot back from Soresby, or at least just tip of information that we have on what his game plan is going to be here. And his game plan, my friends, is to go pretty big. Okay, because if you were gearing up for a big fight against the NCAA, uh wouldn't you want to go, wouldn't you want to go hire the lawyer that's already won arguably the biggest fight against the NCAA to this point? Uh yeah, one of the co-lead, a co-lead plaintiff attorney in the house settlement is who Brendan Soresby has hired here. So you knew, hey, like Texas Tech, you're in that sphere. They're fighting to get you eligible to play. You're going to be able to afford some pretty good legal counsel, my friend. Uh, those billable hours don't really trouble the Red Raiders very much, uh, specifically with the Manador Club. The other thing is, not only was this guy the co-lead plaintiff attorney in the House settlement, he was also the guy that defended Tom Brady in Deflate Gate. So that's who Brendan Soresby is using to defend his honor. The guy that was talking about the amount of PSI in the footballs that Tom Brady had back in the Deflate Gate days. So that's that's what we've got here. That's what we've got. Uh he is labeled as, I did like this. He is labeled as a prominent sports labor lawyer. And again, if you're talking about a specific specialty here that I would want, if I'm possibly in trouble by the NCAA for gambling, I'm gonna want the prominent sports labor lawyer. And guys, the NCAA has been losing lawsuit after lawsuit, okay? So I I don't know, man. What are the odds this actually works? I don't know, but I'm not sure that's even the biggest question here, okay? Please do subscribe to the channel, pushing to 35k subs. We're about to hit 32. Thank you all for being on this ride with me. It really does help if you just click to subscribe if you are watching. Uh, many have sued the NCAA and many have won lately. Uh, one of the most recent, if you're gonna look for like cases that you know, I guess are at least somewhat similar in somewhat the same vicinity, like Trinidad Chambliss, the quarterback at Ole Miss, he did win a suit essentially and is going to get another year of eligibility to play this year. Now, the battle there was over whether or not his 2022 season at Ferris State should count against him or not. He was arguing for a medical hardship because he didn't play with respiratory issues. The NCAA at first said no, but then a judge said, yeah, nope, he's gonna play. Obviously, it's it's a little bit different. We're talking about gambling versus a medical hardship, and frankly, the Trinidad Chamba story, it was it was a little hard to see. Like, hey, why are you not gonna let him do this? Like, that seemed much more sensical. And that is one of my big questions here is about whether or not this becomes some big precedent-setting case, you know, if there is a legal challenge from Brendan Soresby against the NCAA, assuming that they rule him permanently ineligible. Well, could this wind up being some big like all of these cases against the NCAA lately have set wild precedents where it's like they suddenly have no power? Is it possible here that this is something like they can't adjudicate suddenly like guys gambling? Like you can't, I don't know, man. I I know that I had a I think it was my good friend, is it Mr. Shooter, uh, who emails me. Um, he sent me an email, a reader slash listener, and was like, look, I can tell you what is gonna happen eventually. The NCAA is not gonna be able to stop anyone from doing this stuff. Like it'll they'll they'll get sued and something will come about here. So Kessler, Kessler is the lawyer's name. I think is it James Kessler? I Mr. Kessler, I am sorry. I feel like you're probably just called Mr. Kessler anyway. Uh I'm just gonna roll with Kessler the rest here because I forgot to jot down what your first name was. Anyway, that guy doesn't mess around. He's already been a part of the house settlement. He knows how to go after the NCAA. I do wonder what consequences could come of this when all of the dust settles, because I just in this era am not, I am never going to assume that the NCAA wins something. All right, we can talk about what the the actual odds of Soresby playing and all that, and I don't know how long it will take. I am gonna talk about the actual odds of Soresby playing and why my thoughts have changed here just a little bit, because there is a sneaky tweet from this week that uh centers around that. Okay, but as far as like big picture, it's just like why would you ever assume the NCAA is gonna win anything in court these days? Like they're they're just taking L's, man. They are pre-Kurt Signetti, Indiana. They are Kansas football of the 2010s. Like that's that's what the NCAA is right now in court. So you've got a guy who's done it before. Texas Tech, I assume I look, I shouldn't just say that like it's fact. I assume that they would be helping out with legal representation here for Sorce Me. Um he's getting plenty of money from them anyway. If that contract actually goes through, regardless. They're gonna put up a pretty big fight here, it would seem. Um now, what does that mean? I it's crazy when you think about what it could mean the world that we're living in, if all of a sudden this is some precedent-setting case. You got all these student athletes out there with six and seven figure salaries, essentially, and now they can like bet on anything. I don't anyway. As far, I don't, this is not the video I feel like, or the time or place necessarily for that. But as far as like everybody here is much more interested in okay, John, that's great. But like, what's gonna happen with Brendan Soresby? How will that affect the Big 12 title race? All this, like, is he actually going to play? The one thing that opened my eyes a bit to a more optimistic view here, at least from Texas Tech's perspective, a more optimistic view. I'm sure not everybody in the Big 12 would would agree with that. Let's look at this tweet. Okay. Well, thanks for not bringing up my tweet, StreamYard. Love that. It's from Albert Breer, uh, who covers the NFL. All right, so that is one thing to keep in mind here. Albert Breer says Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Soresby's camp is essentially doing this, I'm told, to accelerate the process. They want to see if the NCAA will negotiate a settlement on a suspension. If not, Sorsby will likely go into the supplemental draft. Supplemental draft is usually in early July. Okay, so I talked just a moment ago about precedent-setting case here. If this were to actually go through, go to trial, like there's a ruling. We're talking then about something that could set a precedent. But Albert Breer is saying, look, that it's not about that, John. It's not about that. What it's about is uh Jeffrey Kessler, by the way. It's about can Jeffrey Kessler force the NCAA to be like, look, we don't want to deal with this cat anymore. Kessler's gonna turn around and be like, hey guys, what's up? You remember me? I'm back. And they're just gonna be like, man, we don't want to deal with this. We don't want to risk any kind of precedent being set. We don't want to risk anything crazy happening here. This has not been going well lately. Let's see if we'll just negotiate a settlement, let him play half the season, whatever. That to me is what this sounds like, Albert Breer is saying. Again, this is a guy that doesn't cover college football. He is coming from the NFL side, but like um I mentioned Kessler earlier has been involved in high-profile NFL cases, so there's probably a lot of connections there with folks who cover the NFL. I would imagine this could be coming from that side and through all of that. So that's interesting, right? Now it's like, oh, if you're Big 12 fans, maybe you are gonna have to deal with Brendan Soresby for part of this season. Maybe that is possible. Tech is certainly played in Brendan Soresby, and I'm not saying that this is all he's doing this for. I hope he's getting treatment for the right reasons, and I hope it's going well. But that certainly immediately entering treatment was the best move that you could possibly make if you're hoping to get some kind of a settlement at some point. I know that's why some were like cynical about it when I first started talking about that, as if that were like proof of a problem. Now that we've seen tens of thousands of bets, I mean it seems more plausible that it's a real problem. But either way, it's a it's a nice first step if you're trying to work that. Maybe the NCAA just says, dude, we're tired of seeing this guy. We're tired of seeing this guy, we're tired of taking L's. I thought that at least made me. I look, I'm still overwhelmingly thinking that he is not going to play. But I, you know, I've maybe moved up to like, hey, maybe there's a 20 or 30% chance that Brendan Soresby does actually play a little bit for Texas Tech this year. Um, I'm keeping my eye on it more now. That's definitely a name in attorneys to watch out for. And any kind of once once this really got going into some kind of pushback or trying to make a deal, whatever it's going to be with the NCAA, I just throw my hands up and say, hey, I I do have to recognize that there's a possibility the NCAA could lose, no matter how much of a slam dunk case it looks like it could be. All right. So keep that in mind. Keep that in mind. Now, as I said, that this conflicts with my first take on this, which was no chance that Soresby is playing after the 2022 bet on Indiana. Click here to get all the details on that. That's for everybody watching uh the uh clipped version of this. Everybody who's here watching live, I appreciate you being here. Thank you very much. Uh, it is much, much, much appreciated. Please do like and subscribe. That is very, very helpful. And uh look, we've got some fun coming up here. Cincinnati fans, I definitely need you to stay tuned. But first, let's talk to uh my good friend Pacific Northwest Ute. What's up, Pacific Northwest Ute? You can you can that Soresby will be slinging, so me legal arguments in court, name, image, and lawyers. Oh, you're gonna have to help me out, Pacific Northwest Ute. I'm not getting this one, man. Sometimes the references go over my head. Sometimes the references go over my head. You can that Soresby will be slinging, sow me legal arguments in court, name, image, and lawyers. Now, I do name image and lawyers is a bar. That's good. Name, image, and lawyers is great. Um that's that's that's the NCAA's motto this year. You could combine both things. It's obviously about the NIL and the money being paid to the players, that's a huge factor, but also we've got so many lawyers. Uh okay, you can bet that Soresby will be slinging uh some legal arguments in court. All right, all right, that's it, Pacific Northwest Ute. I get it. You can bet that Soresby will be slinging some legal arguments in court. Name, image, and lawyers. That's good. I love it, Pacific Northwest Ute. Look, we figured it out. We figured it out. Just a typo. I'm sorry that I'm like Ron Burgundy. You know, if you put a typo in the prompter, I'm gonna read the question mark or say, go bleep yourself, San Diego. Uh that's that's what's gonna happen. So you guys, you got you guys got to do this for me. I am I'm not good on the fly there with that. But thank you, Pacific Northwest Ute. I always appreciate your wit. And I'm gonna remember name image and lawyers. We're gonna reuse that. Kim, what's up, Kim? Kim says, if Soresby is ruled eligible to play, I'll give you a$100 super chat. Uh, I just don't see it as much as I want to. Yeah, um, well, first, look, I I wouldn't say no, but I don't want that to be your your own only motivation for this, right? Um, yeah, I mean, like I said, I to me this went from like a 5% chance in my eyes to like a 20, 25% chance, I would say. Um, I do wonder if there's enough there that this guy can twist the arm of the NCAA enough to say fine, play uh at least a chunk of the season. I I think there's zero chance like Brendan Sorsby's not suiting up week one. He's certainly not playing a full season, but can you squeeze it down to a four-game, a six-game, an eight-game suspension? You know, perhaps I will at least open the door to that possibility now, which I definitely didn't, I did not see coming. I did not see coming before this. Uh so thank you, Kim. Appreciate you being here, my friend. Browns and Beers, what's up, Browns and Beers? Uh Browns and Beers says, respectfully, it's not just you, John, but it feels like the step up by West Virginia in the recruiting NIL space has been under discussed by Big 12 channels. Top 15 incoming class in hoops, top 25 in football. I just need, I think the okay, first of all, yes, fair. Uh, my guy, Mountaineer Paul, was texting me the other day. You should go check out, check out Locked On West Virginia. He was texting me the other day about the five-star uh incoming basketball recruit. Um, he was also texting me about maybe I can't say the other one, a player that they were talking about pulling in on a visit that I had a little insight on that could be a really nice weapon and a nice piece. This is basketball, right? We're talking hoops here. Uh with football, I think it's just like people want to see proof of concept first. And then I can understand how you would come back at me and say, Well, yeah, but everybody's talking about Oklahoma State. Like there's a lot of chatter about them, and they're a dark horse, and they just did it in a portal. Uh uh again, I would grant you fair. It's just that Oklahoma State, a little sexier, especially at the quarterback position, man. That's the thing. Quarterback position is so sexy, and Drew Mestima. Mestimaker's just a bigger name than Hawkins, right? In the portal. When people think of Hawkins, they think of crashing and maybe crashing and burning is a little harsh, but just being fairly ineffective at Oklahoma. They had a bad year when he was playing quarterback. Now, I think he could be great under Rich Rod. I I don't doubt that West Virginia is stepping up its NIL game to be where they're at right now and be competitive. And I I certainly don't doubt that that whole ecosystem has a very healthy, very healthy desire to get back to where they feel the football program and basketball program, but especially the football program, should be. Uh so maybe we do need to be talking about it more. My answer would just be I need to see, I need to see proof of concept out there on the field. Um, I told you last year I thought a lot more of Rich Rod's chances to win than Scott Frost's chances to win in terms of doing the rehire, the coaching legend thing. I still do believe that. I still think Rich Rod can have success, but give me give me a little more proof of concept. I do, however, grant you I can see frustration with like, hey, shut up about Oklahoma State if you're not going to talk about us. Uh so there you have it. I'm sure Mountaineer Paul is talking about it all the time because he does a killer-killer job over there. Um, but fair. I hope that will suffice for you, Browns and Beers. I hope that will suffice. Browns and beers, the other thing I would say, I didn't actually watch the video, but I did see Josh Pate had a video up the other day of like, I don't remember what it was called, if it was like programs that are trending in the right direction or like programs I'm buying this year. Uh, and I saw the West Virginia logo on the graphic. So I think you are at least getting some love from him, and that's I mean, that's pretty high praise being a guy who's one really national and two really plugged in. Uh, so I don't think it's it's going totally, totally unnoticed. Um, Browns Beer says, I feel like there's more proof of concept with Richrod, for example, versus uh Eric Morris. Yeah, okay, yeah, again, totally fair. If the conversation is about why is Oklahoma State getting a lot more chatter than West Virginia, I can I can under, I think that's a legitimate beef. I think that's a legitimate beef, and I think we fall victim to the quarterback thing, right? Um, you know, also Wyatt Young, Caleb Hawkins, those guys were really high profile players at their position, too. It's about I don't I'd have to go, Oklahoma State according to it was either 24-7 or on three. I don't remember which one. They wound up with a top 10 class. So it was literally a higher ranked class, too. They were involved with some higher profile players, but it doesn't mean that again, I don't understand some level of frustration there. Uh, because yes, there is more. Yeah, you can definitely argue there's more proof of concept with with Rich Rod at this level. Absolutely. Wet blanket. Here's it, boy. We got a good debate going. Wet blanket says having a first round QB helps. Having a first round QB helps. All right. Browns and beers, wet blanket. You guys may have to go after that. Um all right. Cincinnati fans, this is your time. Please do like and subscribe, by the way. Um, and and pull up a chair. Cincinnati fans. Make sure you're signed up for the Open for Business Big Twelve newsletter at OFBnews.com. Is Cincinnati actually in trouble with the NCAA over Brendan Soresby? I've asked that question before, but we have a new report this time to go in on, and I've gotten a lot of pushback from Cincinnati fans. Are they right to be mad at me? We're gonna talk about that here in this video. Because I would say yes and no. Okay. This is one I really look forward to, this conversation, because I think it's so interesting and it's so pertinent and appropriate in 2026. All right. I know I have to do this like every time we talk about Soresby. Again, quick recap of the story. Brendan Soresby started his career in Indiana, played at Cincinnati for two years, transferred to Texas Tech, got paid over$4 million to do it, or was going to get paid over$4 million to do it until he all of a sudden is under NCAA in NCAA investigation for gambling. He entered a gambling treatment facility. Reports are that Texas Tech may back him in an appeal or legal challenge to the NCAA if they rule him permanently ineligible, which most feel like will happen because he bet on his own team in 2022 when he was playing at Indiana. There are conflicting reports, though. Big part of the story is well, okay, what about Cincinnati? He played for two years at Cincinnati. Did they have any idea about the gambling? And that is where we are going to focus here. How much liability does Cincinnati actually have? And the question, did they know or did they not? Because we have a good old-fashioned report off going on here. We have conflicting reports about this. Now, I was a little surprised by how much pushback I got from Cincinnati fans on social media for simply putting out a teaser video that said there were reports that they knew about Soresby's gambling last year, and then raising the question like, what's going to happen if that is true? And the video that I was putting out there was one of my previous videos about I think the NCAA is a hammer searching for a nail. And if gambling is something they can actually hone in on, they're going to want to come down pretty hard, whether it's on Soresby, whether it's on Cincinnati, whoever's in the way, because they just don't have a chance to rule on much anymore. So I would not feel like they would be taking it softly. And so I thought, hey, I'm saying if, right? I'm saying if these reports are true, of which there are now three from three national outlets that say Cincinnati did know. But I can still understand why Cincy fans were mad. Okay, so I will explain. Uh, please do subscribe to the channel. Appreciate everybody who does uh pushing toward 35k subs. We're about to hit 32. Thank you all. It really does help if you just click subscribe. Bunch of you watch and don't subscribe. It really does help. As far as I can tell, we have four conflicting reports on this subject. Okay. Two that I saw on either side. We basically have in the report off the national side of things and the Cincinnati side of things. Okay, so this is what first set everything off. This is why I made the original video that I did, because this was uh reported by Matt Hayes of USA Today. So Matt Hayes says the Cincinnati Athletic Department was alerted in August that star quarterback Brandon Sorsby was gambling prior to the start of the 2025 season. He cites two people with direct knowledge of the situation. He also mentions, hey, there's this app called Prohibit or Program, compliance-driven app. Okay, they're an app, that shows when a student athlete downloads any kind of gambling app or makes a wager. So this is supposed to alert, like trigger an alert to the schools, like, hey, your star quarterback or whoever is betting. That's a part of what he seems to be referencing here, is like how Cincinnati would have known. So there was that. And that was what really sparked this conversation, got a lot of chatter going. The one that I, I mean, because look, nothing against Matt Hayes at all. I just, he's not in the Ross Dellinger Pete Thamel tier to me of like the guys that are typically breaking most of the news in the sport. So I really paid attention when Ross Dellinger put this out. Okay, so from Yahoo, the guy who's breaking like every big major story these days. Did Cincinnati know about this? Ross Dellinger said Cincinnati is declining comment about Soresby's situation, but several of those familiar and close to the quarterback believe that the university knew of Soresby's gambling exploits since at least last fall. All right, now we're getting to at least last fall, and he is citing sources close to the quarterback. Uh, avoiding reporting such knowledge to the NCAA is grounds for another investigation to be opened. Is there evidence that the Bearcats actually knew? NCAA enforcement officials are certain to pry around. So there is that, because I right now, some of the pushback I've gotten is people saying, well, there's not an investigation. We don't have an active investigation into Cincinnati that's been reported. Totally fair. I was reading this from Dellinger, who again is about as well connected as anybody in the sport, and he's saying he expects that they're going to pry around. So to me, that means there's probably one coming. Maybe they can't handle two at the same time. They'll finish Soresby and then get to this. Or I don't know. I have no idea. But I pay attention to what Ross Dellinger says. Now, that doesn't mean that there's not another side of the story. Okay. First of all, uh, I saw Chad Brendel, who I think does a really good job for Bearcat Journal. He tweeted, and I mentioned this in the initial video, he tweeted sources tell Bearcat Journal that there was no knowledge of Brendan Soresby gambling on events. Let's see if I'll get this to you. Sources tell Bearcat Journal there was no knowledge of Brendan Soresby gambling on events that were against NCAA rules inside the Cincinnati Athletic Department. And so this is why I said in that last video, to me, this starts to get into some semantics here. Now we're talking about whether or not he was this sounds to me like Cincy's like, hey, we may have known that he was gambling, but we didn't know it was on the stuff he can't gamble on. Because you could gamble on UFC, anything where the NCAA doesn't have a sanctioned sport. Okay. That's what that sounded like to me from the Cincinnati side. Then we had the athletic with uh is Justin Williams at the Athletic. He used to cover Cincinnati. Yeah, Justin Williams. Used to cover Cincinnati. Now he's a national guy at the athletic. And his initial report just included the line. Um that's basically the same thing. Sources familiar with the program told the athletic that Cincinnati would not knowingly play a student athlete who violated any NCAA rules, and Cincinnati was not aware of any illegal betting. And so, again, this makes sense to me. He's a guy on the national scene now that has really tight connections with Cincinnati. Of course, he's gonna have sources there. So it becomes clear to me like the picture that's being painted here is Cincy's side is that they didn't know, or they didn't know that it was specifically gambling that was illegal. Maybe they knew, but it was the other stuff, the UFC, whatever you want to say it would be. That seemed to be it. But the national guys are really coming in saying, yeah, people around Soresby think that Cincinnati was pretty well aware. And then the athletic story even was updated. I went back to the athletic story tonight as I was prepping for the show, and look what it says now. Oh, come on, man. The athletic story now, I'll just read it to you since this is not cooperating. Okay, the athletic story now says industry sources told the athletic that the Cincinnati Athletic Department was aware of Soresby's gambling in summer 2025 before the start of last football season, confirming aspects of a USA Today report. Industry sources told the athletic the Cincinnati Athletic Department was aware of Soresby's gambling in summer 2025 before the start of last football season, confirming aspects of a USA Today report. It then goes on to still include the line that sources familiar with Cincinnati's program told the athletic Cincinnati was not aware of any illegal betting. So they just included both portions of that report in there. But if you're keeping track, we'd have the athletic, Ross Dellinger at Yahoo, and then Matt Hayes at USA Today, who have all said industry sources or sources close to the quarterback say that Cincinnati knew at least before 2025 and still played him. So look, we're into a lot of semantics here. This is where Cincy fans and I get twisted. Because my point was, guys, there are report, there are reports out there that Cincinnati did know. There are now multiple reports, these are very credible. You know, the dismissive nature of some of what I was getting on social media did frustrate me because I was like, guys, you can't pretend that this doesn't exist. These do exist, these are credible. If you didn't like the Matt Hayes report, Ross Dellinger and the Athletic piling on here, like it's these are pretty legitimate guys that are saying this. Now I understand Cincinnati has some pushback. And we're now getting into, hey, in my actual video, I said that Cincinnati does have some pushback here, but in the teaser video where I'm limited on characters on social media, I didn't explain the dynamics of hey, since he says this, everybody else says this. The point of that video teaser was hey, watch out for the NCAA if this is true, because I think they're a hammer looking for a nail. So that's what I was building toward with the teaser. But I got jumped for that because it didn't fully explain that there are reports on both sides. And you know what? Hey, I get it. I do, I do understand some frustration with that because this is the world that we live in. When you're trying to promote something and like we're all out here doing this, anybody that creates content, anybody that's in this game, even Ross Dellinger, who's writing his articles, you got a limited amount of characters people are going to read when you're trying to get it out there, and you have a limited amount of characters you can use in the title to try and get somebody to click on a video. And yeah, we're all after click. Like, if this hasn't been established by you know all the stuff that's gone on with the story and the Vrabel story in the NFL, like everybody's after the clicks, everybody's doing what they have to do to get them. That's the name of the game. We are all a bit compromised in that fashion. So it's gonna be frustrating sometimes as a fan the way stuff gets put out there. So I get it. To me, it's like the full long-form content of the video I thought was pretty damn fair. But if you're seeing the title of the video and you're just seeing the teaser online, I understand you're gonna jump and defend your team, you're gonna be sensitive about it, you're gonna be frustrated with it. I would be too if it were my squad, and I've done that many times in the past with other people when they've been talking about K-State or the Big 12 or whatever. So I do get that. But I I also want to make clear like, this is why this is so fascinating to me, because the nuance of this is that in 2026, man, like when we talk about the concept of journalism, we really need to dive deep into this because so often I got so many people saying, I expected better journalism out of you. Like multiple Cincinnati fans, I expected better journalism out of you. And I'm like, guys, I'm not a journalist. Like, I don't I wish I had a breaking news sounder. Like, journalism is not what you find on this channel. There are very, very, very few people in sports, then even in college sports that are doing real journalism. Like Ross Dellinger, Pete Thamel, those guys are doing like real journalism. That's basically their game. But even then, Ross Dellinger does a podcast. Pete Thamel does a podcast, which is pulling in a little bit more of an entertainment angle. We've seen now, again, with the Vrabel story, the links that reporters go to to get the inside scoops, even like Adam Schefter mistakenly tweeting out directly what an agent is sending him. Like everybody's compromised, even the real, real journalist journalist. But guys, I do a talk show. Like I'm here for entertainment. I give you my opinion on what I am reading and what's happening here. So it is. I try not to get so frustrated because I understand not everybody's deep in the weeds of it. But this, this is guys, radio shows are not journalism. Like that's that's not what it is. You've got like one guy who does that medium with true journalism, and that's Pablo Torre. And even then, there's entertainment built into that. So I think it's kind of a sad fact of the world. Like, journalism is sort of going by the wayside, but like in this world where everybody's doing a podcast where they're a fan of a team, or even beat writers can be fans of teams. Like, hey, man, none of this is like straight up, like, none of this is straight up journalism. And this this goes, by the way, to I've had people before respond to my newsletter or something and say, hey, great journalism. I'm like, that wasn't journalism, that was me uh writing a column, like giving my opinion. I can't even like fully accept that because that's that's not what I do here. That's not what very few people do. But I think when fans get mad and frustrated, they want to use that as the attack, like, oh, terrible journalism that you did there. Guys, it's not journalism. Like, I'm not the one with the sources, I'm not reporting on this. Even if you liked what I said, like, you know, I keep the Cincinnati insiders are saying Cincinnati didn't know. Well, okay. The Cincinnati insiders are generally like fans, like, and that that's any school. The insiders, they're fans of that school. They're a little compromised, right? And that goes for me too. Like, I hop on Threemaw, the K-State podcast I do with a couple guys, and you would consider I think it a show of insiders. We're all biased, guys. We're all biased. We like K-State. So, yeah, we're gonna believe K-State when they tell us something or when someone tells us something positive about K-State, like sifting through all that's impossible. This is not about like great journalism, okay? So, anyway, it's a frustration of mine as far as what it means for Cincinnati. It'll all come down to if they're telling the truth and if if there is probably more importantly, whether or not there's a paper trail. Because even if they're not, and this is you know, trying to massage the narrative a little bit, if there's no paper trail, they'll probably be fine. My only point in doing the segment that I did earlier was if they get caught, if there is something here, if this did happen, if the three national reports are correct, I would worry about the NCAA being overly punitive just because they're trying to make a point when they don't have much to be punitive about anymore these days. And if you're searching for like real reputable, if you are truly seeking real reputable by the book, Woodward and Bernstein journalism, it's hard to find anywhere. It's hard to find in sports, it's hard to find in college sports. What you are seeking is reporting that you like. You're you're seeking journalism that you like that makes you feel better right now. Um, and not I there's not enough characters in every headline, there's not enough characters in every teaser tweet to be able to fully convey nuance in a story. I do understand your frustration with that. So if you want to see what all the fuss is about, you're like, John, I don't know what the hell you're talking about. Click here to watch the original video. All right, that's for everybody who's watching the clip version. Those of you that are hanging out here live, I do appreciate you, my friends. Uh, keep hanging out because we've got more to come here, including a uh a stroke of genius from Bret York and some really, really staggering Big Ten news. Okay. Um I think this is funny. I don't know if this is uh a joke or not. I kind of hope it's a it's a joke and taking a shot because this is funny. I would say, hey, touche, this is funny. John, we don't come here for facts, not to worry. I'd like you you should come here for entertainment and for my opinion, my take on what's going on. That's that's what I'm giving you. And uh I will try to bring you the best reporting that is out there, even while saying even the best out there. Like there are different, there are different compromises here. To get to, that's a whole different show. But like to get to the point where you are an Adam Schefter, a Shams Charnia, a Diana Roussini, right? You you gotta you gotta do some things that are not like the buy the book Woodward and Bernstein journalism thing. So even the the best quote unquote in the game these days, it's uh it's a little bit sticky. It's a little bit sticky. Okay, I wanted to uh I wanted to take a second to show one thing here that I found very, very entertaining uh from this past weekend. Let's let's let's look at this real quick. I think I'm gonna have to pull this down. All right, so what you're looking at here is Shador Sanders. All right, first of all, congratulations to Shador Sanders, who was a college graduate, thought that was a cool thing this weekend, went back to Colorado, graduated, had a 3.9 GPA, and he's here recreating the photo of his dad, who was once at his uh 49ers locker room, who had the the uniform laid out like that, very nicely done. And I do want to single this out like Shador is a lightning rod, people crush him. I'm not saying he's been perfect. Uh, you know, we didn't do a whole lot of Colorado talk here on this channel. Um, just you know, sometimes if you talk about like really playing for the clicks sometimes, like people can get into that with the Colorado stuff. And I, you know, I tried to tell like it was with Colorado's program, but Shador Sanders was a phenomenal player, and I do think sometimes people assumed a lot of things about him that weren't really fair. I mean, he went back and got his degree, went back and walked at Colorado and had a 3.9 GPA. Like that's that's a cool thing that should be singled out. But look at the wall. I many people have maybe seen this before. I saw this for the first time and I was like, this that's legitimately cool. I like that. Like I almost want it on my wall. Uh, this is obviously Coach Prime's office. It says you look good, you feel good, you feel good, you play good, you play good, they pay good. That's a hell of a saying, man. That's a great wall. I how had I not seen this wall yet? I love this. Obviously, for the player, that makes sense. I would think this is like the argument I used to always use back when I wanted K-State to be playing in alternate uniforms, like look good, feel good, feel good, play good, like come on, and you win games. What are we doing here? But I'm also now as I start to age into my uh mid to late 30s, I'm like, hey, you know, sometimes that feeling good thing is yeah, looking good helps, but what about like feeling good just like some comfort? You know, for Shador, it's making sure he's got whatever gear he's gonna have on at the game. Uh for me, it's like I'm standing all day at a game. I'm I'm gonna need some comfortable shoes. Um, can I, you know, do I have the good socks, like the good Costco socks that are very comfortable here? Like, I need to be comfortable to feel good. And then if I'm feeling good, does it pay good for me as well? I spent a ton of time on my feet this weekend. I'm like, I need some more comfortable shoes, man. If I'm gonna feel good to then play good, will it still pay good? I don't know. That is that is my question here, okay, as as a now rapidly ascending toward middle-aged man. Anyway, I love the wall. I love this for Shador. Thought it was a cool thing, thought it deserved some mention uh here on the show. So shout out to uh shout out to Shador Sanders and uh and Colorado football for having that happen. Please do like the video, subscribe to the channel. You can hit me up on Venmo at John-Kurtz-4 if you want to submit a super chat that way. I will kick off the next show with your question or comment. So you can be a part of the action, even if you're not here live. Those of you who are, you know that you can click the dollar sign below the chat box to submit a super chat if you want to guarantee that you make it on the show tonight. Brent Yormark may have done it again. Ladies and gentlemen, found a way to inject millions of extra dollars into the Big 12. And he did it by sneaking something into that private capital deal that's just not being talked about enough, in my opinion. I'll tell you what that is in this video, how long it may take to develop, and what you can expect in terms of impact on the schools. If you're a Big 12 fan, what does it mean for my school? So we have the new Big 12 private capital deal. Notice I am saying private capital. Some, if we're talking Cincinnati fans, if we're talking about twisted headlines, a lot of those national headlines said Big 12 private equity deal. It's with private equity companies, but it's it's it's capital, it's not equity. So, okay, that's making sure that the headline is something that draws clicks. Again, we all do it. We that's the game. We've got to do it, we gotta get you in. All right. Um, honestly, though, it does seem like this story has not been as big of a deal as I figured it might. You know, I think we've we've been through enough rounds of headlines about this where it was reported six months ago. Going back like two and a half years, that the Big 12 had first started exploring some of this. So we've kind of I think some of that is people are like been there, done that. I've heard about this before. People are a little desensitized. You know, you also had the Big Ten story where it was doing private capital flirtation with like a multi billion dollar deal. Utah has already announced its$500 million private. Private equity deal. It's been long reported that a bunch of schools are looking into doing the same thing. You know, Florida State sued its entire conference to try and get out right. We're just some of this stuff by now, we're like, oh yeah, this is what happens in college sports these days. And the Big 12's deal is relatively small potatoes, money-wise, right? It's only 12 and a half million for the league office, up to 30 million for the schools, and the league office can take another 12 and a half million. So you're talking about like 24, 25 million, maybe for the Big 12, and then up to 30 million for a few schools, but the reports are only two to five are going to be interested. And we've been seeing schools turn it down. BYU said no. UCF was the latest to come out and say no. We're not we're not gonna take the money. We support this in as a whole, but we're not taking the money. Utah, I would imagine, is not gonna do it with their big deal. Texas Tech, I'm sure, doesn't need it. Kansas got$300 million from David Booth. They probably don't need it. Like it's pretty easy to start adding up the nose to this. But I I really think people are missing the main point of this deal. And to me, that is where the stroke of brilliance from Brett Yormark comes into play. This has been pitched as a three-pronged business deal, right? One part of that, the Big 12 says, is like, hey, look, we as a league office are going to take at least 12.5 million, maybe up to 25 million, to invest in other revenue generating opportunities. We're trying to find different ways to create revenue streams, make money. They claim that Redbird and Weatherford, their partners here in this deal, have already created 130 million over the next five years with stuff like the PayPal deal and the players' tournament that they're in. And that's piece number two here. It's a long-term partnership with Redbird and Weatherford Capital to create more revenue. These are, yes, both like private equity places, but also they they have sports portfolios, more on that in a moment, and have worked with lots of professional sports teams to generate more money. Like that is that is their job. And then, of course, the third prong here is yes, the schools can take up to$30 million. And that's what gets most of the focus. But number two on this list seems the most boring, and I think it's the most important part. The prong number two is the most important part. Not enough people are talking about it, and it's because of implications in the next TV deal. Please do subscribe to the channel, pushing to 35k subs. About to hit 32. If you watch, but don't subscribe. It does help me a lot if you subscribe. All you have to do is just look at how the Big 12 itself is describing this deal to know what the most important part is. When the Big 12 talks about it, they call it the Redbird Business Development Partnership. The Redbird Business Development Partnership. They are talking about Redbird here. All right, so what is Redbird then? Well, it is a New York-based investment management firm with$15 billion in assets. Okay. Private equity place,$15 billion in assets. Included in that is AC Milan, which they own. They have a minority stake in the Red Sox. They're involved in NASCAR, the UFL, lots of different places here where they are helping to generate revenue. But the most important piece of this included in that portfolio is Paramount, which currently owns CBS and is expected to soon acquire TNT. Those are a couple of big players in the college sports TV world these days. All right. And we are talking about driving up the cost of the next media deal for the Big 12. That's unbelievably important. Okay, I'm going to talk about the Big Ten's latest financial numbers in a moment. TV is the biggest thing that drives all of this. The revenue for the conferences, the biggest chunk of it comes from TV. And this is exactly what Cody Campbell is trying to do with saving college sports and pushing the Sports Broadcasting Act changes, which would allow everybody to pull their rights together to make more money because there would be more suitors, better organization, and more of like a scarcity complex with the actual inventory that's out there to drive up the cost for the media deal for college sports and make everybody more money. That's what your mark's trying to do here. Bring more suitors to the table. Okay. Obviously, Fox and ESPN, you say what you want, and there are plenty of criticisms about how each of those entities treat the Big 12, but you do already have pretty strong working relationships with them because they've been big partners of yours for a while now, right? Yormark signed the deal, got in front of the Pac-12. The Big 12 has been partners with them now. And they have been deepening relationships already with CBS and TNT TBS. Like we've seen the football and basketball games this year on TNT TBS. CBS got some basketball games, even NBC, like some basketball games were on Peacock. Like your mark's been clear, very clearly strategically maneuvering this to deepen the hooks within all of these TV partners to give yourself the best opportunity to get a bunch of competition, drive up the price on what your next TV deal is going to be, and start developing business relationships that earn some trust that can net you the best deal. And I think this is this is his biggest strength. We can also talk about how he has started to position basketball, to be decoupled and maybe sell basketball separately from football to also make some more money. I think this is clearly like Brett Yormark's biggest strength. What is the biggest accomplishment he's had right now? Even the Brett Yormark haters have to admit he kept the league alive because he jumped the Pac-12 on the TV deal with Fox and ESPN. And that was just a massive thing for the survival of the league. And without that, you wouldn't, you may not have a Brett Yormark Big 12 to be angry at because that's the reason that it still exists right now. I think he's earned a lot of trust on this topic. I'm certainly trusting this move here that seems to be very wise in terms of positioning the next TV deal, and it's going to create millions of extra dollars per school over the lifetime of that contract. Now, it's going to take some time because the next TV deal doesn't come up until 2031. And there is always the risk of, hey, will we have a super league by then? Will the Big Ten and the SEC have expanded again and just turn this into AFC, NFC? All possible. All of that certainly possible. But you just got to cross that bridge when you come there. And you have to operate right now if you're Brett Yormark, like there will still be a Big 12, and you've got to, you've got to best position yourself for that TV deal if and when it comes. I just think things like this, which matter more and more, increasingly more and more in college athletics these days, he is very, very good at. And so he's earned trust, at least in this arena, from me. I think he should have from you. And I think this is one to pay attention to because it's going to make your school millions of extra dollars. Enough to catch the Big Ten? No. Enough to catch the SEC? Absolutely not. Enough to be competitive with the ACC? For sure. For sure. And squeezing every penny that you possibly can right now out of the TV deal is pretty, pretty damn important. Okay. I think your mark, I'll put it this way, will make up at least a little bit of ground on the Big Ten and SEC because of this type of thing. And that would not happen with other commissioners. Like I think that is where he is excelling right now. Talked about basketball. How exactly will basketball make the league more money by decoupling? Click here to find out. That's for everybody watching the clip version. Those of you guys hanging out live, do not worry about it at all. I've got uh one last thing to talk about. Also financial, but we have to pop in and get a couple of super chats before we head there. Uh PB7145, thank you for this, PB7145. Don't sell yourself short. The Big 12 has the best sports media. Your honesty over a decade plus of turmoil and adversity helped save this conference. We appreciate what you all do. We need you. Hey, I genuinely, genuinely love hearing that. Thank you for taking the time to say that and to submit a super chat while doing that. Incredibly kind. I do really appreciate it. I I hope, and I think it comes across, but I hope it comes across that it's, I mean, it's a labor of love for me. Like I I was not making any money at all when I was doing this channel, and the news about Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC broke, and I just started getting on and speaking my mind as somebody who attended the first Big 12 football game in 1996 and has grown up in Big 12 country and loves this conference deeply, and used to watch the Phillips 66 basketball commercials that would the guy bouncing a tire at the free throw line back in the 90s and early 2000s. Like that, I'm as Big 12 as it gets. I love this conference. And yes, I was going to give you my opinion and try and speak up for this league. And that's that's my role. But my role, I mean, I I'm not trying to dig into deep sources at every single school in the league. Like, I don't want to be a newsbreaker. That has never appealed to me. That lifestyle, honestly, just sounds so stressful. I don't look, I'll be honest with you, I've been considering ditching a smartphone and just having a flip phone these days lately. Like, that is not, I am not trying to do that. Um, but I'm gonna stay informed on what other people are reporting and give you my opinion on it. Uh, PB7145, thank you very much. I appreciate that. Um, Alan, what's going on, Alan? Alan says, John, pleased to see Tyron Stokes signed. Yes, Kansas again, getting arguably the best high school player in the nation to come play. Now, I BYU fans, I know you would dispute that last year with Darren Peterson and AJ DeBonsa. I said arguably. Okay. Uh pleased to see Tyron Stokes sign. 10 more years, Bill. Any insight on who will be KU's quarterback? Too late to lure Avery into the portal. Well, these days, once again, Alan, never say never. Uh, you never know. I I don't I don't think that's gonna happen, but you know, you could ghost transfer someone in and challenge the NCAA. I don't know who's gonna be KU's QB. I was doing Allen actually at the Big 12 tournament. I was poking around asking some KU people I know about that. And I was just getting the answer that it was gonna be a a wide open battle. I mean, I will just say, as somebody who watched Cole Ballard almost scheme his way to a win over K-State a couple of years ago, I always thought that guy was pretty damn salty. You know, and that was a good K-State defense that he almost beat. Um anyway, so yeah, I don't, I don't, the long story short is I don't have a great answer or much insight on that. I have not talked to anybody like throughout spring ball or post-spring ball on it. So I don't know. But now that now that you mention that, maybe I'll maybe I'll see what I can find out, Alan. That's definitely a really wide open battle at Kansas. Uh and and yes, on Tyron Stokes, that's that's a great thing for the league. Like you talk about once again, all eyes are going to be on the league. Like Tyron Stokes should command a bunch of attention, get a lot of national spotlight in terms of what people are talking about with the game. He's the it's the second straight year. I saw some people saying this. Well, the Darren Peterson thing was more like the Kobe Jordan comparison, right? But then I saw uh someone the other day, uh, someone that had coached, I think, against Stokes, like, oh, he's he's got, you know, this is like LeBron. Like, if the quote was, this is like if LeBron went to college. So, okay. Last year you had Kobe and Jordan. This year you got LeBron. The TV cameras are going to be on the Big 12 watching that. So it is definitely a good thing. Alan, I appreciate you. Thank you for being here uh tonight, my friend. Thank you for your support of the channel. Let's see. Okay, final thing for you tonight. Are we now in a power one world where the Big Ten rules all? Because it's starting to feel that way. The latest headline suggests we are moving closer to that. The league already has the advantage on the field. We know that. Big Ten's won the last three national championships. And wait till you see the advantage they now have off the field. Okay. Even the SEC is falling way behind here. And what do you do if you're the Big 12 of the ACC, man? There are a lot of questions with this one, okay? That's what I will aim to answer and dissect in this video for you. So the headline here is about the amount of money that the Big Ten made this year. The Big Ten made a lot of money, right? Tony Petiti has been extremely aggressive in pushing forward with everything. Kevin Warren, his predecessor, was extremely aggressive. We know that, well, the Big 12 certainly was a huge part of breaking up the Pac-12. Like the death blow was getting the four teams that can't getting Oregon and Washington uh to come over. Kevin Warren was a huge part of that with the Big Ten. They've been very aggressive for a long time. They now have 18 members. It's a conference that stretches basically C to shining C. They've won three straight national championships. Like it's blossoming, burgeoning. You know, I mean the SEC, I like the SEC much more in the fact that they have stayed true to their roots and they're a regional conference, and it makes sense. But if you're talking about generating money, creating shareholder value, all these things we talk about these days, the Big Ten's doing a better job of that than anybody. Uh Big Ten, here's the headline. The Big Ten generated nearly$1.47 billion in the 24-25 fiscal year and distributed$1.37 billion to its 18 members. That according to the uh the league on Friday. So that's a massive number, right? You hear that number. The Big Ten basically made$1.5 billion last year as a conference. You hear that and you think, well, that's just a huge number, but I do need some context, John. I've got the context for you. Okay, if you're a Big 12 fan, that is just over$1 billion more than the Big 12 made. Let that sink in. That is just over$1 billion more than the Big 12 made last year. But it's almost half a billion more than the SEC. So the SEC, basically half a billion, half a billi behind the Big Ten right now in terms of revenue. Fair to point out, Big Ten's got two more schools than the SEC. That that is certainly a contributing factor. That's a pretty healthy financial advantage. This is also$540 billion more than the previous high for the Big Ten. Now, what is going on here? Well, it's the first year where you had the first 18-member season. It's the first year under the new TV contract. And it also coincided with the 12-team college football playoff, which means the Big Ten's bringing in more money there because they got four teams in, two in the final four, and then Ohio State won the national championship that year. So they're getting a lot more money coming in from the college football playoff than perhaps they had in previous years. If you want to know, all right, John, that's all good and well, break it down by school for me. Okay, well, how about$91 million for Ohio State? Ohio State made$91 million from the Big Ten. Um in the Big 12, we're talking like a$35 to$40 million range for the payout. Okay. Ohio State$91 million. Now, some of the Big Ten schools are like in the 70s. You know, it depends on what are you doing again. Ohio State won the national championship. They're bringing in more money that way. But that's a sizable advantage. What is Ohio State doing with this? What can Big Ten schools do with this that give them a real advantage here? Because you can't funnel this all into the players necessarily. You got the Rev share. That it will be much easier to do that. It's less of a strain on your athletic department to do that. But beyond that, where does this advantage show up? I I feel like I continuously preach here. Coaching staffs, support staff, you know, things like you see these schools in the Big Ten with like awesome, awesome. I'm about to say A V, like it's the 1980s or something. But like their digital media is great. Oregon has those unbelievable like cinematic videos that you see every week coming out. Like you can pay a staff of people so much more to do that kind of thing than if you're like in the Big 12, like it can you can really be skimping on the salary for people like that because it's just something that's much more expendable. But that's look, that's not the real advantage here. It's coaching staffs, it's support staff. And it's not just, we're not just talking about the Big Ten versus the ACC and the Big 12. We're talking about even the SEC. Like I go back to Josh Pate saying not that long ago that I think his informed theory on part of the reason that the the Big Ten has such an advantage right now over the SEC is that the SEC got a little bit lazy with its coaching staffs over the years because like turned into much more of just like a good old boy network and maybe not pushing as hard as they could for like the best at every position because they had so much talent it didn't matter. There was so much more talent stockpiled that the coaching edge didn't matter quite as much. If you have the better Jimmies and Joes, obviously it's not foolproof, but you didn't need to grind quite as much on pulling in the absolute best of the best coaches there. Well, now the Big Ten can do that at a healthier rate than you can because they're bringing in so much more money from their TV deal and being paid from the conference. Like if they have that extra pool of money, that really helps when you're talking about staffing. You're trying to keep a high profile coordinator, you can just load up and pay him a monster salary, right? I mean, we're well into the seven figures for a lot of these coordinators now. What is I mean, Matt Patricia? I should have looked at this before the the show. I mean, Ohio State's paying Matt Patricia. Matt Patricia salary, Ohio State.$3.75 million. It's actually increasing to$3.85 million after that. That's crazy, man.$3.75 million. That's where your advantage shows up. Ohio State can pay that to a coordinator because they got$91 million from the Big Ten last year. It's it's tougher to be competitive with the Big Ten if even you're the SEC and they're they're making 50% more than you as a conference. And one thing I would add here for Big 12 and ACC fans, this is why you're seeing things like the Big 12 doing a private capital deal. But like if you ask that question, like why do this? Why take a payday loan? You know, I saw some derisively calling it a payday loan. Why do this? What are you supposed to do? The Big Ten just made a billion dollars more than you this past year. You've you've got to find some way to try and compete, man. And it's money isn't everything, and coaching can really help, but then you got to hang on to your coaches. Where did the Big 12 just lose arguably the two best coaches it had in the conference? They lost one to Michigan and Kyle Whittingham, and yes, I know there are some extenuating circumstances with that, but they lost the other one, Matt Campbell to Penn State to the Big Ten. They can just pay a ton of money to take your coach. So this is this is the reality. All things are coming up Big Ten right now. On the field, off the field, the finances of it all, like they are they are pulling ahead. And and they're the this is what makes I mean, you know, they were the ones they were talking about that UC investments deal, private private capital up to like$2 billion and finding ways to make even more revenue. Like they're not. I know I got shot down for now, but Tony Petiti is not quitting on trying to find more ways to generate money. And oh, by the way, according to all these financial reports that came out on this, shout out to the Athletic and Scott Dockerman that have the story here. How much do you think that uh Tony Petiti made this year? Tony Petiti made$4.5 million. It's not bad. It's not a bad gig. Uh he's gonna keep pushing forward there. By the way, the Big Ten had enough money to pay Jim Delaney, who's not the commissioner anymore and hasn't been the commissioner since 2020. Found a way to pay him$5.82 million in bonuses and deferred compensation. Plus$600K in consulting fees. Good gig if you can get it. Good gig if you can get it. Uh all right. Thanks for hanging out tonight. Please do like and subscribe on your way out. If you have not, so many people watch the channel and don't subscribe. It really truly does help if you subscribe. I would much appreciate you doing that. It's totally free, as is subscribing to the Open for Business Big 12 newsletter at OFBnews.com. That is ofbnews.com to get signed up there. Hit me up on Venmo, John Dash Gertz-4 if you want to submit a super chat for the next show and you weren't here watching live. Uh thank you all for being here. I hope you have a great week. I hope you enjoy what's left of your Sunday nights, and I will talk to you all very soon. Take care.