The Illegal Recruiting Scandal Widens at TCU

Ron Zell Brewer, a reserve tight end on the Texas Christian University football team, was suspended Tuesday after saying he had been receiving cash payments in violation of NCAA rules, Coach Jim Wacker said.

Brewer, a senior, was the seventh TCU player to be suspended since Thursday amid allegations of illegal recruitment practices.

Brewer was recruited in 1981 under the school’s previous football coaching staff and spent the 1984 season as a redshirt.

Former TCU quarterback Anthony Gulley said cash payments by TCU boosters to football players were common knowledge among team members under former coach F.A. Dry, and another player said the payments were widespread.

“A majority of those who came in my year (fall of 1981) were aware of what was going on,” Gulley told the Dallas Morning News. “It wasn’t any big secret. All the guys recruited by Coach Dry knew what was happening.”

Wacker said Tuesday that when he arrived in December, 1982, there were 29 players receiving payments from boosters.

“When we came in, the boosters evidently cut that list to nine and made a decision not to let me or anybody know that,” Wacker said at a Horned Frog luncheon.