QB Brendan Sorsby Fallout: Who's Texas Tech's Next Man Up In College Playoff Bid?

Somewhere, buried deep inside the lawsuits and the threats and the NIL money and the gambling and the NFL Supplemental Draft and the moral ground ...

There is gonna be football.

For the last few months, the headline-stealing story of Texas Tech's 2026 football season was all about the status of transfer quarterback Brendan Sorsby and his gambling problem. ... and all the other problems that sprouted like branches from that troubling tree.

Was Tech wrong to side with Sorsby in trying to keep the former Cincinnati quarterback eligible?

To some, that remains a headline-stealing story as they perch themselves in a moral ground that is more mucky than they want to admit.

But Sorsby - bowing to the legal pressures that he and Tech brought on themselves - is now saying goodbye to Lubbock and steering himself toward an NFL Supplemental Draft.

So ... what's next for the Red Raiders, who planned on making another trip to the College Football Playoffs with Sorsby under center?

What's next is to maintain that plan ... with the next-man-up QB.

Texas Tech's presumed backup to Sorsby, dual-threat sophomore Will Hammond, is still rehabbing from a torn ACL suffered in November of last season. With Sorsby entering his senior season, Hammond already figured to be the full-time starter in 2027, but we're a ways away from that.

But that is then. Coach Joey McGuire and Tech need a "now.''

Enter Tech's other transfer quarterback, former Tulsa QB Kirk Francis, who now figures as the most likely candidate to start the 2026 season as the signal-caller.

In three seasons with the Golden Hurricanes, Francis appeared in 18 games (10 starts), completed 58 percent of his passes (270/462) for 3,045 yards, and accounted for 18 touchdowns and 13 interceptions.

His best season came in 2024 when he threw for 1,585 yards and nine touchdowns. The former walk-on got redshirted his freshman year in 2023, and in 2025 he appeared in just three games as freshman Baylor Hayes took over Tulsa's offense for much of the year.

So while it's a far cry from Sorsby's high-level production at Cincinnati, Francis brings some starting experience to Tech.

Joining Francis for depth in the QB room are Lloyd Jones III, a 6-4 redshirt freshman out of Hitchcock, Holden Phillips, a local product from Wolfforth Frenship, and true-freshman Stephen Cannon from Savannah, Georgia.

Francis likely thought his role would be to serve as a stop-gap third-stringer upon committing to Texas Tech. It's a position Mitch Griffis covered last year as he transferred in from East Carolina to back up Behren Morton (now in the NFL with the Patriots) and Hammond.

But with Sorsby's goodbye and Hammond potentially still hovering below 100-percent healthy, Francis is the most likely candidate to take over the offense for the defending Big 12 champions.

And even though the QB is changing, the plan remains the same.