WHAT IS THIS ABOUT?
FOOTBALL
Oregon mess not representative of most recruiting services
Dave Matter
Ten years ago, major college football programs had no use for Scott Starks.
“He was a player that most people took a pass on as being too small,” Danny Heitert recalled, remembering Starks as being 5-foot-7½ as a senior at Hazelwood East High School.
But Wisconsin got a tip that Starks was worth a scholarship offer. It wasn’t a free tip. Heitert’s St. Louis-based scouting service, STC Grid Report, had given Starks a high grade despite his size. As a paid customer of Heitert’s service, Wisconsin followed up on the suggestion.
Three years later, Starks was a first-team All-Big Ten cornerback and became a third-round NFL draft pick.
For Heitert, Starks’ tale is a shining example of scouting services working the way they’re intended — not the way they’ve been characterized by recent headlines.
Every year, college football programs spend thousands of dollars outsourcing portions of the recruiting process to companies like Heitert’s. With so many prospects from coast to coast and such little time to research them all, companies have capitalized on the opportunity, compiling detailed scouting reports, background checks and sometimes video footage — all for a price that many teams are willing to pay.
“There’s a lot of very helpful recruiting services out there, legitimate ones, that are indeed an aide to our programs,” said Mitzi Clayton, Missouri’s assistant athletic director for compliance. “For whatever reason, budget reasons or a timing reason, we’re not able to be everywhere in the country looking at every prospect.”
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That’s where the recruiting services can become valuable — and pricey. Missouri currently subscribes to nine services and spent approximately $44,000 on those subscriptions last year, team spokesman Chad Moller said. The most Missouri spent on one particular subscription last year was $7,500.
That might sound costly, but the Tigers pinch pennies compared to Alabama. The Birmingham News reported in May that Alabama spent $218,628 on scouting services during the last three years.
“We use it as a resource of information to know about who might be out there, especially in a five-hour radius of here and the areas where we actively recruit,” Alabama Coach Nick Saban told the Birmingham News. “We might use that to get a peek at a guy, then contact the high school coach, get more information on the guy, get some legitimate video on the guy and try to do our evaluation system here.”
Among the services Missouri uses are Randy Neu’s Texas Sports Films; The Prep’s Report, a service that specializes in Florida prospects; LRS Sports, which focuses on players in the Southeast; and Elite Scouting Service, the former employer of the industry’s latest outcast, Willie Lyles.
In 2010, ESS President Charles Fishbein reportedly fired Lyles, who went on to launch Complete Scouting Services in Houston and landed Oregon as his first client. The NCAA has since launched an investigation into the school’s relationship with Lyles, who said last month in multiple interviews that Oregon didn’t just pay for his scouting services but for his “access and influence” with several Texas players who later joined Chip Kelly’s Oregon’s team. If the NCAA determines Lyles was acting as a booster for Oregon’s recruiting efforts, the program could face hefty sanctions.
“As soon as a recruiting service and a football program are having ongoing conversations, that program is very likely off the reservation,” Heitert said. “There’s a bright red line there by NCAA regulations.”
The impact of Lyles and Oregon’s relationship could reverberate beyond those involved in the latest NCAA scandal, but other national scouting services say they embrace the oversight that governs their industry.
“There’s been some companies I’ll call unethical or companies that don’t have the kids’ best interests at stake and some college coaches who are probably the same way,” said Dan McCain, senior manager for LRS Sports. “But we welcome the NCAA rulings that are out there.”
Under NCAA Bylaw 13.14.3, schools are allowed to subscribe to an unlimited number of scouting services provided the service is available to all institutions at the same rate. Among the other rules, scouting services must publicly list their rates and distribute their scouting reports to their subscribers at least four times per year.
Unlike Lyles’ fledgling company in Houston, LRS Sports has built a massive database of high school and junior college prospects from Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and South Carolina. The company employs three former high school coaches as its chief talent evaluators, including Dwight Thomas, who was Emmitt Thomas’ high school coach in Pensacola, Fla.
Their interaction with players is limited to camps and combines, and all player data and evaluations are kept private from the athletes and their families.
To learn more about the players in their database — which lists 18,000, McCain said — Thomas attends camps and stays in the same dorms as the players.
“It’s so he can see them and how they interact with each other,” McCain said. “He’s getting a better perspective than just a video that shows them on the field.”
Heitert also specializes in what he calls an “in-person, feet-on-the-ground intelligence.” Every spring, he flies to camps and scrimmages in Alabama and Florida to evaluate players for his files. In the summer and fall, he stays in Missouri and its bordering states, logging around 20,000 miles between camps, practices and games.
“Game film gets you 95 percent there,” he said. “But there are some things in film that really can’t be detected.”
Heitert’s subscribers include schools in the Big Ten, Southeastern Conference and Big 12. Missouri has never paid for his services.
Compliance departments across the Big 12 share a list of scouting services that have checked out as legitimate companies, Clayton said. And starting this fall, the NCAA will publish a list of services that meet its requirements, a move Clayton said is long overdue and should help compliance departments “weed out some of the services that weren’t quite up to snuff.”
WHAT IS THIS ABOUT?
WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE?
WHAT WAS HAPPENING HERE?
NCAA investigation preliminary finding: Oregon Ducks broke rules in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011
- Updated: Feb. 24, 2012, 11:35 p.m.|
- Published: Feb. 24, 2012, 10:35 p.m.
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By
View full sizeAssociated PressChip Kelly
A NCAA investigation into the Oregon football program has come to a preliminary conclusion that the Ducks broke rules in 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 according to documents released by the school on Friday.
The NCAA investigation and a parallel investigation being conducted at the school’s behest by the law firm Bond, Schoeneck & King are continuing.
The NCAA’s proposed findings of violations are not a Notice of Allegations, a formal procedural step that would indicate the NCAA is ready to make a case. A UO spokesman said the school has not received a formal Notice of Allegations.
The first of the documents was received by the school on Dec. 16. After Oregon responded to the first document, the NCAA followed with a second notice of proposed findings that included some minor changes.
UO general counsel Randy Geller said the school received the revised proposed findings in February. Geller said Oregon again has responded, and is waiting to hear from the NCAA. Oregon does not necessarily agree with the NCAA’s proposed violations, a UO spokesman said.
The documents suggests that the Oregon football program broke a series of NCAA rules between 2008 and 2011:
- The Ducks improperly used three recruiting or scouting services, Elite Scouting Services, New Level Athletics and Complete Scouting Services between 2008-2010.
The services are allowed to deliver only written reports and videos to their clients. Preliminary NCAA findings indicate the Ducks received oral reports from ESS and NLA, and from CSS in 2010. In addition, CSS did not provide Oregon with the NCAA mandated minimum for the number of formal reports it must provide a school in a calendar year.
Elite’s Charles Fishbein disputed the NCAA findings.
“Everything we provided was available in hard copy and on our Web site,” Fishbein said.
Baron Flenory, who runs NLA, and Willie Lyles of CSS could not be reached for comment.
-
In the years 2009, 2010 and 2011, Oregon used an impermissible athletic department employee to recruit. It was not clear Friday who that was.
-
The athletic department failed to adequately monitor the football program’s use of recruiting or scouting services, and failed to adequately establish policies and procedures to monitor the football program’s use of recruiting or scouting services.
The NCAA’s preliminary report found seven violations. Four were completely redacted by the school, citing the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, or state law and Oregon Administrative Rules. Another was redacted partially.
Oregon first came under NCAA scrutiny in March 2011 when reports surfaced that the football program had spent $25,000 on a national recruiting package from Lyles and CSS in 2010, shortly after highly-recruiting running back Lache Seastrunk signed a letter of intent with Oregon. Lyles had a mentoring relationship with Seastrunk.
It subsequently was revealed that the Houston-based Lyles functioned as a mentor or advisor for a number of Oregon players from Texas, including LaMichael James, Tra Carson, Dontae Williams and Marcus Davis.
Seastrunk, Williams and Davis left the program while having remaining eligibility. James declared for the NFL draft this winter after his junior season.
Oregon went 44-9 in the period in which the NCAA alleges Oregon broke rules. The first of those years marked Mike Bellotti’s final season as head coach before Chip Kelly took over and led the Ducks to three consecutive berths in BCS bowls, the most lucrative of postseason games. The record in the overall span marks the Ducks’ most successful run in football history.
Last season Kelly was paid a base salary of $2.8 million. In the 2012-13 season he is scheduled to be paid $3.5 million. If the situation escalates, his contract states that the university has “just cause” to terminate him if he knowingly violates NCAA rules in a way that adversely impacts the university or results in the football program being placed on probation.
In an email to Oregon supporters, athletic director Rob Mullens emphasized that the NCAA process is continuing.
“While we have no specific timetable on the inquiry, we remain in close communication with the NCAA as the process advances cooperatively through each stage,” Mullens wrote. “Currently, pursuant to the NCAA’s process, we are in constructive negotiations with the NCAA on the draft of their proposed findings.”
Oregon also launched its internal investigation in March. Through the end of calendar year 2011, Bond, Schoeneck & King had billed the school $100, 527.44.
The school has not released an invoice from the law firm for January in response to a public records request from The Oregonian this week
ANYONE SEE BILL’S NAME INVOLVED IN CAUSING THIS SITUATION?
Willie J. Lyles bio
Age:
31
Background:
Lyles says, in an interview with Fox Sports Radio, that he attended Texas Southern University, and worked as a high school coach before moving into scouting.
MSL Sports:
Lyles says he worked as director of southwest scouting for this now-defunct New York-based service from 2005 to late 2008, when it folded.
Elite Scouting Services:
Lyles says he started this Florida-based service with former MSL colleague Charles Fishbein in late 2008 or early 2009. Says he left in late 2009 to start Complete Scouting Services on his own. Fishbein says he fired Lyles in January 2010 for “nonperformance.”
Complete Scouting Services:
Lyles registered this Houston-based service with Harris County, Texas, in December 2009. No website for the company is registered until March 2010.
Lyles-Oregon timeline
December 2009:
says he leaves Elite Scouting Services, where he has worked since 2008, to start his own company, Complete Scouting Services. His boss at Elite, Charles Fishbein, is unaware of Lyles’ plans.
Jan. 9, 2010:
Lyles, rather than attend a college coaches’ convention on behalf of Elite, as instructed by Fishbein, attends the U.S. Army All-American Bowl in San Antonio. He goes with
, a highly recruited running back from Temple, Texas, whom he mentors.
Jan. 27, 2010:
Seastrunk, who at times has been recruited by USC, Texas, LSU and Auburn, commits to Oregon.
January 2010:
Fishbein says he fires Lyles from Elite for non performance. Lyles says he’s already left. About this time, Fishbein says, UO coach
informs him the Ducks will no longer use Elite’s services, which it purchased in 2008 and 2009.
Feb. 3, 2010:
Seastrunk – and Houston running back Dontae Williams, another Lyles’ advisee – sign national letters of intent with the Ducks.
Feb. 22, 2010:
Lyles, on Complete Scouting Services letterhead, bills UO $25,000 for “2011 National Package.”
March 2010:
Fishbein receives a W9 from UO for $25,000 payment to Lyles and Elite. Fishbein notifies UO that Lyles is no longer an employee of Elite.
March 16, 2010:
Complete Scouting Services website is registered.
March 24, 2010:
UO issues $25,000 payment to Lyles and his new business, Complete Scouting Services.
Dec. 9, 2010:
Lyles, calling himself a trainer/adviser, attends the Home Depot College Football Awards show in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., as a guest of Oregon running back LaMichael James.
March 3, 2011:
Yahoo Sports first reports UO payment to Lyles.
March 13, 2011:
Fox Sports report labels Lyles “the most dangerous” street agent in college football. Among claims made in the article: Lyles attended high school practices with Oregon running backs coach Gary Campbell.
March 14, 2011:
A week after an LSU signee meets with NCAA investigators, Fox Sports reports LSU paid $6,000 in December to Lyles.
March 30, 2011:
ESPN reports that Van Malone, a former Texas A&M assistant coach, alleges Lyles sought more than $80,000 in 2007 from the Aggies in order to procure the commitment of Patrick Peterson. The highly recruited defensive back, who eventually signed at LSU and denied any involvement with Lyles, went on to become the fifth overall pick of the Arizona Cardinals in the 2011 NFL draft.
April 2, 2011:
James defends Lyles in an interview, saying, “Him and me are really close. I talk to him all the time. He has never steered me wrong or given me bad advice.”
April 30, 2011:
Lyles breaks his public silence, saying in a national radio interview, that allegations of him steering players to colleges for money are “unequivocally false.”
June 20, 2011:
Oregon releases documents related to the case as part of public records requests by various media outlets.
Sources:
The Oregonian, Yahoo Sports, Fox Sports, ESPN
WHAT HAPPENED?
Stormfront doxxing.
In 2005 - I worked for a company called MSL sports. The first meeting I set up was through Lane Kiffin. He was the OC at usc under Pete Carroll. Before I joined MSL they sold video from combines. The ncaa stopped them from doing so. I was hired and created profile books which had all the top players in florida. Pete Carroll looked at the book and bought it. He than asked if we could do this in other states. MSL hired Willie and about 3-4 other scouts. I oversaw the department.
In 2008 after a great coaching convention and MSL branching out to create a thing called grid iron bash - the company went under. I decided to create my own company called elite scouting service. I have a business partner who gave me money to start elite. We decided to take all the people who were in the scouting department and bring them with us. Willie was one of them. The only one not to come was Chuck Muncie who played in the NFL. I stayed friend with chuck until he passed away a few years ago.
Willie was one of the scouts. Before I hired each scout I told them as did my partner they could not sell players to colleges. That is not the business we were in. I wanted to hire a second scout in Texas but no one would come with me with Willie working for us. I could not fire him based on rumors even though I had concerns. My one demand from all my scouts was they had to go the coaching convention. I paid for ticket and Willie never showed up. I fired him the next day. About 2-3 months later I get a tax document for 25k from Oregon. I was not going to pay taxes on money I never received. 25k was also more than twice the amount we had ever received from a school. Oregon was going to pay Willie 100k but the state of Oregon has a law where anything over 25k goes up for bid. Willie never got paid the amount. I hired a lawyer to look into it and we found out that Oregon paid Willie 25k - he cashed the check and it had Willie Lyle’s elite scouting. Someone at the bank cashed the check for him. Oregon messed up. I reported it to the ncaa and they investigated my company as well as Willie. We opened up our entire contact to the ncaa - they came down to south florida and spoke to over 30-40 coaches if not more. They found nothing. Willie and Oregon paid the price.
My only mistake was hiring Willie….the stench was tough to overcome. I have and came out better. That being said my success has led to other being jealous and the ncaa did not let up for over ten years. We now have a great relationship because I give them an open book to my company.
Lyle’s was an employee of mine. He was never a partner which the story got wrong. Willie was responsible for delivering cam newton to Auburn.
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I never heard all that background, Fish. Very interesting, and I’m glad you came out of it a success.
THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT OWNS AND RUNS THESE UNIVERSITIES……
WHO OWNS THE NCAA?
BOARD OF GOVERNORS……
WHO PICKS THEM?
LETS HEAR THE STORY ABOUT FURMAN AND WHY BILL WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR JOE ROSE FINDING OUT AND LEADING TO HIM TALKING ABOUT IT ON THE RADIO?
SO FAR THE WAY THIS IS PLAYING OUT BILL WAS MAKING ACCUSATIONS AND THEN IT HAPPENED BY THIS TIMELINE……
305, I am going to write a book one day called fish tales …I have been through a lot.
He made accusations based on a relationship I had with willie Williams. He would come on this site and say I should not be allowed since I was paying Willie. Even put up a dollar amount. He continued the lie for a very long time even though it was bs.
Once again - when bill accused me of paying kids I was only writing articles for rivals fsu site. To this day I still have certain coaches tell me how they heard about this bs on this site. You think that no one from Miami had never been on a this site or had someone relaying messages. I hear word for word comments made on this site from others. Bill had an issue with me and would not stop the lie.
Even after I fired Willie - I never went on one show to discredit him. I ran into him about a year ago and he apologized.
Storm, no matter what people like bill said - I have gotten through that bs. I have over 300-400 contacts. I have head coaches from colleges who respect my opinion. Why, because I have always done it the right way. Never one time has a parent or coach said I asked them for money in return for a player. That is a fact…so no matter how much your butt buddy tried to slander my name it did not matter. It’s all good…
YOU SAID BILL GOT THAT FROM FURMAN….
YOU SAID JOE ROSE TALKED ABOUT IT BECAUSE IT GOT TO HIM….
STORM KNOWS FOR A FACT ROSE KNOWS FURMAN……
WHY WOULD BILL BE THE ONE RESPONSIBLE?
THE PERSON THAT STARTED THE RUMOR IS RESPONSIBLE AND RESPONSIBLE FOR THE RETRACTION TO CLEAR YOUR NAME….
YOU SAID YOU GOT A LAWYER FOR THAT STORM CAN TELL YOU NO LAWYER WOULD UNDERSTAND WHAT YOUR LAWYER WAS DOING UNLESS YOU DIDN’T WANT TO GET TO DISCOVERY FOR SOME REASON OR THE STORY WASN’T TRUE…
SO YOU SEEM TO BE HONEST ABOUT THIS WHAT HAPPENED?
IT SHOULD BE AN EASY ANSWER TO CLEAR YOUR NAME…
AND AGAIN YOU STOOD BY STORM FOR YEARS AND STORM KNOWS THAT BUT YOU SAID FCKED UP SHIT YOU SHOULD NEVER SAY ESPECIALLY BEING A PUBLIC PERSON….
THAT IS WHY WE ARE HERE…
YOU MADE AN ACCUSATION DEFEND IT……
STORM WILL TELL YOU SOMETHING ELSE IF YOU ARE RIGHT STORM WILL AGREE WITH YOU……
BUT STORM HAS NEVER SEEN OR HEARD ANYTHING SAYING BILL WAS AT FAULT……
SO TO STORM YOU CROSSED LINES AND ESPECIALLY THE COMMENT ABOUT THE FAMILY……
UNFORGIVABLE….
STORM WILL WRITE A BOOK CALLED DIAPER FACE CATFISHY TALES……
STORM’S BOOK WILL OUT SELL YOURS….
You did too. What harassment? Going to run and hide again?
THE ONLY OTHER COMMENT STORM WILL MAKE IS YOU ARE PART OF A CORRUPT SYSTEM THAT YOU DIDN’T SET UP….
NOT YOUR BUSINESS ITSELF THE SYSTEM IT DEALS WITH (COLLEGE FOOTBALL AMD SPORTS IN GENERAL)
SO IF YOU ARE CLEAN HATS OFF TO YOU……
IT IS UNFORTUNATE BECAUSE YOU PROBABLY LOVE WHAT YOU DO….
STORM LEFT PUBLIC WORK FOR THAT VERY REASON……
Storm gets owned in very conversation
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