How Eric Morris Supported Joey McGuire Throughout Brendan Sorsby Situation

FRISCO, Texas — Former Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Sorsby isn’t in the conference anymore, but his name came up plenty during Big 12 Media Days on Tuesday.

In a somewhat surprising turn, Texas Tech head coach Joey McGuire name-dropped Eric Morris multiple times when asked about the Sorsby saga.

“For my peers, I got a lot of support,” McGuire said. “Eric Morris, the first day any news broke, called me and said, ‘Hey, man, I’m just doing a well check.’ He’s a good friend of mine.”

Morris shared his side of that conversation later in the afternoon.

“I called him, and first words I said to him is, I said, ‘Hey, we’re not talking about anything to deal with the situation you’re going through right now,’” Morris said. “‘I just know sometimes some people need to vent and get some stuff out to somebody who realizes what it’s like to sit in those chairs and have those things come across your desk at times.’ And so, yeah, it’s important to check on the people that you care about, especially if you know they’re going through a tough time.”

That relationship started a full decade before either man took the helm of a Big 12 program. Morris started as the inside receivers coach at Washington State in 2012. At the time, McGuire was entering his 10th season as the head coach of Cedar Hill High School, located about 17 miles southwest of downtown Dallas.

McGuire took over at Texas Tech ahead of the 2022 season, and obviously, Morris is preparing for his first season in Stillwater this fall.

“I’ve always believed in people and relationships first and foremost,” Morris said. “And I started recruiting at Cedar Hill my first year at Washington State, and Joey was always so good to me as a 23-year-old kid coming through. He sat me down and kind of explained the lay of the land of DFW in recruiting and players, so he’s always been so helpful for me. So we started a relationship, you know, 20 years ago, and so somebody we’ve always stayed in touch. When he got to Lubbock, he reached out a ton to me to ask about offensive staffing, to ask about Lubbock in general, ask about my experiences. So we’ve always had a great relationship, and I think when you sit in the chair of being a head coach, and there are certain things, and especially nowadays with social media, that I think can wear on you, and I know Joey is a good human, and he loves those kids that he coaches.”

On a follow-up question, Morris clarified how he felt about the Sorsby situation.

“You always want the best for your own and the people you are developing and you’re in the trenches with,” he said. “At the same time, I think just morality throughout sports, and not even talking about college football, just sports in general, is there’s a bunch of people that had a problem with it, and rightfully so. … But I got enough problems at Oklahoma State right now. I haven’t spent any amount of time, and those aren’t my problems, and they’re not my decisions to make either. And so I learned a long time ago not to worry about the things I can’t control.”