Yes, but I think you’re still right that he can’t join an NFL team as a free agent this year since he didn’t participate in the draft.
As for the UFL, they usually hold a supplemental draft in the summer, so I think he could theoretically participate in that. If he were a guaranteed first-rounder in the NFL draft next year, it would probably be worth it to wait. But in the real world, maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to attempt to prove himself with a season of the UFL and try to sign with an NFL team in the window next June.
Patriots receiver Kayshon Boutte was not suspended by the NFL despite being arrested for underaged gambling, including betting on his own team, whilst in college. The chrges were eventually dropped after he completed a gambling addiction awareness classes. So maybe Sorsby could escape a suspension if he gets his stuff together.
An NFL suspension? He’s not going to play for the NFL this season.
The NCAA suspension? Sure, there’s a chance. Doesn’t even have to get his stuff together. But he’s going to have to do a lot better at expressing remorse. And maybe stop threatening lawsuits all over the place.
Boutte isn’t exactly a good comparison. He had already been drafted and played a season before the charges came up.
Sorsby was trying to get to that point, where he became an NFL team’s problem to deal with. And as a QB, one they couldn’t just cut loose. But the League office cut him off before he could get that far.
No, a walk-on is another way of saying undrafted free agent. Those ‘couch’ players signed up for the draft and/or have used up their college eligibility.
ETA: I guess ‘unrestricted’ free agent is more accurate. A non-rookie free agent could absolutely be signed from the couch as well.
Otherwise, a team could collude with college players not to enter the draft and then sign them after the draft. And this is a ‘win’ for the players, too, since there are no limits to the contract they can get as an undrafted free agent, even as a rookie. You can imagine what sort of shenanigans that might lead to with say…a promising QB pick and a team desperate but without a good first round pick position. That’s obviously not something the NFL or even most teams want.
Exactly. UDFAs/walk-ons are guys who were eligible to be drafted, but weren’t. And since Sorsby did not file for eligibility for this past spring’s draft, and as the NFL blocked his plan to go into the supplemental draft, he’s apparently un-signable by an NFL team this year.
He is learning the lesson of “play stupid games, win stupid prizes.”
What is the incentive for a college football player to participate in the draft? Why not just graduate from college (if they even want to do that), then entertain offers from whichever pro teams are interested? If you’re good enough to be drafted, you’re good enough to be offered a contract without the draft, I would think. And if you’re not good enough to be drafted, then participating in the draft doesn’t get you anything.
College eligibility may be clouding the understanding. The only criteria to file for the NFL draft is to be 3 years removed from high school graduation. There’s no college requirement at all. But clearly the 3 year restriction means players are heavily incentivized to play in college. They aren’t going to get sufficient development or practice if they don’t.
But if you don’t file for the NFL draft ever, you aren’t eligible to play for the NFL ever. That’s to avoid the situation you describe. The absolute top players could then avoid the rookie contract restrictions for draftees and get massive contracts by colluding with teams who can offer them insane contracts to sign directly with them instead of filing for the draft. The league and most teams would not like to play the game of “be known as the best backroom dealer and have top college players not even take part in the draft”. The PR nightmare would be immediate and intense.
The college eligibility discussion was only relevant for Sorsby because if he was eligible to play in college (due to his lawsuit and the resulting temporary injunction), he did not have a valid reason to provide in his application for the NFL supplemental draft. The supplemental draft is for players who’s life situation has changed suddenly in such a way that they would have filed for the regular draft if they had known beforehand. In this case, his gambling issues came to light rather late for the regular draft.
So, he dropped his lawsuit (college suspension back on), thus becoming ineligible to play in college and providing a legitimate (ish) reason why he did not file for the regular draft but would like to be part of a supplemental draft. He is still eligible to file for next year’s regular draft but would rather not deal with the a situation where he’s not practicing or playing for a team for an entire year.
Lions cornerback Terrion Arnold arrested on armed robbery and kidnapping accusations, may face life in prison.
I can’t remember seeing a more serious arrest for a current player on an NFL team since Aaron Hernandez, and I’m not sure he was still on the Patriots when he ended up in jail for homicide.
He was, in fact. The murder, and Hernandez’s arrest, occurred in June of 2013; he had played his last game in the Patriots’ last game of the 2012 season (the AFC Championship Game). The Patriots released him on June 26th, the same day that he was charged with murder.
There is a Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NFL and the Players Union. So the only way for a football player to join the NFL is through said agreement. And the agreement lays out the rules, including the draft, the supplemental draft and UDFAs.
I think – though I may be wrong – that there’s an exception to this rule, though it’s not relevant to Sorsby’s case: international athletes.
Professional athletes from other sports in other countries – soccer, Australian rules football, and rugby – have joined NFL teams without declaring for the NFL draft.
Huh, that’s actually an interesting edge case. More interesting than entitled morons and teams desperate enough to sign them, anyway.
I hadn’t really thought about international players. I wonder what qualifications they have to clear to be able to play. Almost certainly their local equivalent of a high school degree and probably at least a few years removed from it, too. But I wonder what else.
It seems to be mostly about age and/or years removed from high school. For example, Jarryd Hayne, a star Australian rugby player, wanted to try American football. In 2011, when he was 23 years old, he attempted to play college football in the U.S., but as he had not completed high school in Australia, he was ruled ineligible to play in college. He had tryouts for the NFL in 2013, and was signed by the 49ers as a free agent in 2015. He played in eight games that season, as a 27-year-old rookie running back and punt returner, before returning to rugby.
As another example, Darren Bennett was an Australian rules football player, who started playing professionally at age 17. He had a tryout as a punter with the San Diego Chargers in 1993, when he was 28, and in the U.S. on his honeymoon; the Chargers signed him as a free agent. He then spent 1994 on the Chargers’ practice squad, was sent to play in NFL Europe in the spring of 1995, and then won the Chargers’ punting job during the 1995 preseason; he was named All-Pro as a 30-year-old rookie in 1995, and was named the punter on the league’s All-1990s team.
Back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when soccer-style placekicking began to take over in the NFL, there were several international professional soccer players who joined NFL teams as kickers despite never playing college ball, such as Toni Fritsch and Toni Linhart (both from Austria) and Garo Yepremian (from Cyprus, but played professional soccer briefly in England).
Funny enough, the current punter for the Seahawks, Michael Dickson, he is Australian and didn’t attend high school in the US and had previously played Australian football in Sydney. But he still was able to play American football in college in the US, because they had an international exchange program similar to what the NFL has, called “Prokick Australia”.
In 2015, the then 19-year-old moved to Melbourne to trial with Prokick Australia, a coaching program designed to help aspiring kickers and punters cross the Pacific crack American Football.
Tapes of Dickson consistently sending the foreign footy 50-60m caught the attention of the Texas Longhorns, the athletic program out of the University of Texas.
Before too long, Dickson was on his way to the United States with a scholarship in hand and the attention of the burnt orange community.
He then went into the NFL draft from Texas instead of doing his senior year, became a Seahawk, and the rest is history. (He showed off his skills in their most recent Super Bowl victory too, pinning New England near their goal line on more than one punt.)
It may have been different in the past, but I believe international player do need to declare for the draft. In 2017, the NFL set up the International Player Pathway.
As far as I can tell, every international player currently playing did declare for the draft, just the vast majority went undrafted.
But going through that to the NFL’s IPP page, it describes players being “assigned” to teams with a different division selected each year for international assignments. And even getting an extra roster spot at the start of camp to account for them. It sounds like some players have signed directly. I’ll have to study up on how that works.
In any case, it’s a fascinating edge case. Unlikely to produce the next franchise QB but it’s certainly possible to find and develop some solid role fillers.
Though Brendan Sorsby has apparently not publicly mentioned any interest in playing in the CFL, the Canadian league has pre-emptively said that he isn’t welcome.
Edit: The article says “for the upcoming season.” This isn’t really accurate: as I noted upthread, the CFL season starts much earlier than the NFL season, and is already underway.