2012 NFL Draft: NFL Teams Playing Dirty Pool with Top Prospects

For the second time this week, news was "leaked" that could potentially damage the stock of a possible Top 10 pick in April's NFL draft.

And, once again, the situation reeks of an NFL team using dirty tricks in an attempt to cause a player to fall.

On Friday, the Miami Herald's Barry Jackson broke the news of a 2009 incident involving Iowa offensive tackle Riley Reiff that ended with the Hawkeyes standout being subdued by eight police officers and pleading guilty to intoxication and interference with official acts.

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"Officers reportedly found him undressing and acting disoriented in an alley when he ran into a nearby kitchen. The pursuit lasted 20 minutes and involved eight officers. He pleaded guilty to intoxication and interference with official acts, but teams aren’t concerned about his character. Regardless, it's tough for [the Miami Dolphins] to justify taking another offensive lineman in the first round, with so many other needs."

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This news comes just a few days after the supposedly confidential Wonderlic test score of LSU cornerback Morris Claiborne was leaked to the media. As news of Claiborne's woefully low score of four out of 50 spread, so did speculation about who leaked the information. As former Indianapolis Colts general manager Bill Polian relayed to USA Today, it's very possible that an NFL team could have been responsible for it:

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"'I have no proof whatsoever, but for quite some time — and I'm not alone — we believe it's done by agents to try and denigrate one player at the expense of another,' Polian said.

"'But that's not to say clubs wouldn't do it, either. Whoever is doing it, it's reprehensible, a serious offense, against the law.'

"'I don't think you can take personal information given you voluntarily by a potential employee and make it public.'"

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For their part, the National Football League agrees with Polian that these offenses are serious, and the league sent out a memo to all 32 teams this week stating that any team caught leaking this sort of information would be subject to "significant discipline."

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"'Disclosing this confidential information about draft-eligible players to the public can be extremely damaging to players, clubs, and the league,' the commissioner's memo said. 'Bear in mind that the publicly-disclosed information is frequently inaccurate, incomplete or misleading, and often results from an effort of an individual to advance a self-interested goal.'"

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Enforcing this policy would be next to impossible, however; the very reporters who break these negative stories aren't about to reveal their sources, and most NFL front offices would likely have the sense to, at the very least, use some sort of third-party intermediary.

However, it does appear a bit fishy when the reporter who broke the Reiff story just so happens to work for a paper in a city where the NFL team may well have an interest in the player in question. This isn't to say that I'm accusing either the Miami Dolphins or Jackson of anything unethical, but Jackson's assertions that the Dolphins aren't interested in Reiff and that other teams, "aren’t concerned about his character" seem all the more curious in an article from Miami about Reiff's character.

These sorts of shenanigans are nothing new in the National Football League. Wonderlic scores, arrest records, negative scouting reports and the like have been disseminated by teams for years, not to mention the usual disinformation campaigns that teams wage in regards to player interest and draft intentions.

However, just because it's been going on for years doesn't mean it's right, and releasing this sort of information for no other reason than to damage a player's reputation (and draft stock) is, at best, unethical—and, at worst, illegal.

That isn't going to stop some NFL clubs from doing it, though, and until some team gets caught red-handed and is hammered by the commissioner's office, many NFL teams will continue to keep playing Liar's Poker with a marked deck.

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