Willie Lyles, a recruiting scout involved in an ongoing recruiting scandal, was involved in a pay-for-play scheme for fomer LSU cornerback Patrick Peterson, ESPN reported late Wednesday.
Former Texas A&M secondary coach Van Malone told ESPN Lyles said he needed to top “$80,000” in order to sign Peterson.
Lyles was already in hot water about possible NCAA violations with Oregon and LSU.
Prior to the report, LSU officials held the position they merely paid Lyles for game tapes of junior college prospects. It would be an NCAA violation if Lyles were directly involved with a recruit.
Senior Associate Athletic Director Herb Vincent confirmed to The Daily Reveille on March 15 LSU paid Lyles’ business, Complete Scouting Services, $6,000 in December for tapes of junior college prospects from Kansas and California.
LSU never had a formal contract with Lyles’ business, Vincent said.
“Some of these reports say we’ve stopped using him or we’ve severed ties,” Vincent said. “The fact is, we bought a service from him. … We were provided with that service and paid for it.”
Peterson’s father, Patrick Peterson, Sr., told ESPN Lyles runs a kind of “escort service.”
“”This is my first time hearing this. This is a shocker,” Peterson Sr. said. “”It could have happened. It could have come out of [Lyles’] mouth, that’s what happens.”
The report came at the same time Wednesday night when HBO Real Sports had a segment on former Auburn players being paid hundreds of dollars while in school, which is against NCAA rules.
The segment featured former Auburn defensive end Stanley McClover, who said a man affiliated with LSU approached him at an all-star camp during the recruitment process and paid him.
“Somebody came to me, I don’t even know this person and he was like, ‘we would love for you to come to LSU and he gave me a handshake and it had five hundred dollars in there. … that’s called a money handshake … I grabbed it and I’m like, ‘wow,’ hell I thought ten dollars was a lot of money back then,” McClover said. “Five hundred dollars for doing nothing but what I was blessed to do. I was happy.”
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