In the world of college football recruiting services, $25,000 is quite the price to pay for information. The number is what the Oregon Ducks forked over to Will Lyles, a self-proclaimed recruiting analyst from Texas with ties to Lache Seastrunk and LaMichael James, the latter of which is a star running back at Oregon and the former may be the next star running back. For $25,000, you'd expect Lyles to hand over a comprehensive, broad-ranging package that included detailed prospect profiles, video and evaluations. Instead, Oregon received information that was outdated, narrow in its scope and downright laughable in terms of its usefulness, according to a report.
Lyles handed the Ducks a book of 2011 player evaluations, which would be fine and within NCAA rules. The problem, however, comes when looking through the profiles: None of the players belonged to the class of 2011 and many were prospects from two years earlier. Of the players listed, almost all were from Texas and few were major-conference prospects.
The profiles were so sloppily put together that they included the same name twice, a player Oregon faced in the BCS National Championship and another player who had tragically passed away in Sept. 2010 (via The Oregonian)
Two profiles appear of the same player. One profile was a redacted bio page for privacy reasons, presumably a recruit who wound up at Oregon.
Tragically, another listed recruit, wide receiver Josh Rake out of Southlake Carroll High School in Southlake, Texas, died in a car accident in on Sept. 30, 2010 during his freshman year at the University of North Texas.
The recruiting profiles were only part of the package and the Ducks have yet to release any video that may have been provided by Lyles. Oregon has said it's been unable to differentiate which video came from Lyles and which came from other scouting services. But for $25,000, the volume of videos better be substantial, especially considering the lack of information in the written reports.
The NCAA has been on the Oregon campus to investigate whether any wrongdoings occurred involving the Ducks relationship with Lyles and his relationship with a few high-profile recruits out of Texas. There's been no word on when the investigation will wrap-up and what Oregon may face because of it.