The University of Oregon Athletic Department, on Thursday, confirmed that they had hired high profile lawyer Mike Glazier to work with the school regarding possible NCAA violations that ocurred within the football program and became national headlines back in March.
According to State of Oregon expenditure records, Oregon paid $25,000 in the spring of 2010 to Willie Lyles of Complete Scouting Services in Houston, Texas. Oregon immediately confirmed that they had indeed paid the money to Lyles, but asserted that they were well within the NCAA rules in doing so.
There are multiple problems, however. Services such as those supposedly renered by Lyles usually cost in the $5,000 range, meaning Oregon either severely overpaid or something simply doesn't add up. In addition, Lyles is a friend and mentor of Oregon running back LaMichael James, and the team also made the $25,000 payment to Lyles after 5-star recruit RB Lache Seastrunk signed his letter of intent to Oregon. Seastrunk had attended Lyles' camps.
Under NCAA rules, Lyles would be classified as a booster if he was involved in the recruitment of players to Oregon, and any payment would be considered a violation of Bylaw 13.
In a response to the allegations, on March 4, the University of Oregon released the following statement in defense of the payment:
The athletics department paid for services rendered by a pair of scouting services that were processed through the athletics department business office to Complete Scouting Services and New Level Athletics. This is no different than services purchased by a number of colleges and universities throughout the country.
This is something we remain confident that is within the acceptable guidelines allowed by the NCAA and occurred with the knowledge of the department's compliance office.
We have previously stated that we have not been in contact with anyone from the NCAA or Pacific-10 Conference in regards to these practices and that situation remains unchanged.
The NCAA began an investigation shortly thereafter, and little by little more information has been released. In the most recent news, for the $25,000 Oregon paid Lyles, they received information on recruits from 2009, which would have been useless at the time because in the spring of 2010 Oregon should have been receiving information on 2010 recruits. Because of that, the payment looks even more suspicious.
Hiring Glazier, nicknamed "The Cleaner" by other clients, is - although not an admission of guilt - at least a signal from the Ducks that the NCAA investigation is very, very serious.
Oregon hired Glazier in March, but it didn't become public until late this week.
According to George Schroeder of the Eugene-Register Guard, who broke the story on Friday, Glazier is working with the Oregon program for multiple reasons:
When a school hires Bond, Schoeneck & King, the intent is, among other things, to convince the NCAA “this school is probably serious about trying to clean up its house,” says David Ridpath, an assistant professor of sports administration at Ohio University and a longtime observer — and frequent critic — of the NCAA’s investigative and enforcement process.
But also, Glazier is on board to “choreograph the response,” Ridpath says. His role is to find ways to package the problem, to portray a difficult situation in the best possible light, to somehow minimize the severity of the damage.
Often, that last part means copping to the misdeeds — or at least, some misdeeds — and self-imposing some penalties.
The Ducks haven’t shown any inclination to do that yet. Glazier declined an interview request Thursday. But for now, the strategy is clear.
Oregon will contend it simply made a bad business decision, which isn’t against the rules. Lyles, the Ducks will say, provided useful information in other forms than spreadsheets, video and outdated documents.
In any case, the investigation is likely far from over, as these sorts of things never seem to go quickly. Oregon is set to begin the 2011 season with a September 3rd showdown in Cowboys Stadium against the LSU Tigers, in a matchup with incredible national title implications.
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