The Anonymous Scout Phenomenon: Inside the NFL Draft's Shade Season

Did you hear the one where...?

When it comes to the NFL draft, there is no bigger lure than the aura of the anonymous scout. It's just two little words that seemingly carry incalculable weight in any report. No thought is too thoughtless, and no dis is too distasteful when it is sourced with the idea that it was said by someone from within NFL front offices.

The latest has been an incredible report about Oregon quarterback Marcus Mariota from our own Michael Freeman that teams didn't appreciate Mariota's remark to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers website, where he said it didn't really matter to him whether he went first overall. The idea, of course, is that teams would like Mariota to be more competitive.

Poppycock!

This is no different from any absurdity of the anonymous scout phenomenon.

One year, it's that Minnesota quarterback Teddy Bridgewater's knees are too skinny. Go further back, and it's that Green Bay Packers signal-caller Aaron Rodgers is just a system quarterback. Arizona Cardinals safety Deone Bucannon had a "real mental concern," while another said those mental concerns aren't a concern because Bucannon played golf in high school.

Yep, that was a thing.

Perhaps one of the biggest misnomers from fans about this racket is that members of the media are just making up the quotes. Maybe that's possible, with some. The NFL draft has become such a massive ordeal each and every year that it's realistic to assume that maybe a "quote" here and there is actually just a schlub in the media trying to make a name for himself, but that's not the majority of the quotes.

No, this is truly NFL personnel saying these silly things.

If there is power for a reporter in writing some variation of "anonymous scout," understand that the scout derives just as much power while shirking all responsibility in the fact that he remains anonymous. It's the same power that drives a mild-mannered, otherwise normal human being to become an Internet troll behind his or her anonymous screen name and Twitter egg.

Because, when one gets right down to it, that's all the anonymous scout is.

A troll...with you, dear reader, as the victim.

The Myth of Secret Knowledge

Rogelio V. Solis/Associated Press

One of my favorite truisms of scouting is that it's an inexact science.

There is skill involved, yes, but no matter how trained one is in the art of player evaluation, there will always be mistakes. No one is the perfect scout. Two of my absolute favorites on the media side of things are Gil Brandt of NFL Media, who revolutionized the process, and Greg Cosell of NFL Films. Put the two of these men together in a room, and there may be more football knowledge than if all 32 general managers sat next door.

Brandt had Johnny Manziel as his top prospect at one point last season—not just top quarterback, top overall. Click that same link and see New York Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. at No. 47.

As for Cosell: Well, he had Giants backup Ryan Nassib as the best quarterback a year earlier.

I trust those two men's opinions as much as anyone when it comes to their scouting acumen. Yet, everyone makes mistakes. Teams make them all the time! That's how guys like Tom Brady and Russell Wilson can both precipitously fall down draft boards and then meet in the Super Bowl years later.

It's how teams cannot only pass on someone like recently retired linebacker Chris Borland because they didn't think he was going to be a great football player, but also praise him for his love of the game he just gave up after one season.

This is why teams don't trust one scout alone on a player.

There are checks and cross-checks. When an area scout loves a player, he has to praise that player for weeks on end just to get his superiors to take note. When those superiors do, they'll assign other low-level scouts and work up the food chain, with the personnel directors only getting involved if the player really starts moving up the draft board.

At my first-ever Senior Bowl, I was bumming around with Wes Bunting, a promising young media scout for the National Football Post. He had been taught directly by Mike Lombardi, who is now with the Patriots, but he had been writing for NFP at the time. Because of the connection with Lombardi, Bunting was chummy with a lot of scouts who may not have given this first-year writer the time of day.

Yet, I'll always remember what one anonymous Philadelphia Eagles scout said to us: "I couldn't do what you do, because I'd hate for people to see all my mistakes."

That's a good anonymous scout quote to remember.

These guys are not perfect. They do a job, and their bosses think they do it well. Doing said job 24/7 gives them better insight than those of us who do it as part of a bigger job or those who do it only as a hobby. I'll trust a scout on evaluating a player the same way I trust a doctor when it comes to my health.

That said, if someone told me an anonymous doctor said the cure for the common cold was a crowbar to the noggin, I wouldn't go around getting my smash on.

The allure of the anonymous scout is strong because we only see these opinions in a vacuum. We don't know if the anonymous scout who thinks Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston is "more likely to be a bust" is the same guy who hated Bridgewater's knees. In the same way, we don't know if the same scout who slammed Missouri linebacker Shane Ray thought Rodgers was a system QB.

There are hundreds of scouts who work for NFL teams.

By keeping them anonymous, we see only the opinions without the ability to consider the source. This makes the scouts seem above reproach, but just like every other human being on the planet, they will be wrong far more often than they will be right.

We just don't get any chance to judge that.

Hate the Players and Hate the Game

Jeff Chiu/Associated Press

This is how it goes, so you better be used to it. 

Anonymous sources—scouts or otherwise—aren't ever going away. I rarely report here at B/R, because that's not my role. When I find cause to, however, it's almost impossible to get a name attached to even the most mundane of news reports. Sure, it may not matter to the agents (my goodness is it almost always the agents) that their name gets attached to a report of a third-string punter getting signed, but the second people know they talk to the media in such an open way, they lose a little luster.

This is the life in a business where even close friends end texts with "keep my name out of it."

You can wish reporters put names to reports. I do. I don't think a guy should be able to blast a player on a personal level without attaching their name to it, but it's how this thing works. A reporter can't use it without anonymously sourcing it, and he won't get the info ever again if he burns that source...from that guy or anyone else. Word travels fast.

In a setup like this, it's pretty easy to see how people can take advantage.

As a member of the media, "scout speak" is gold. Sidle up to any scout in a bar (check Veets in Mobile, Alabama, around Senior Bowl time, there will be a few) and buy him a shot and a beer. From then on out, it's pretty much like a normal transaction. He'll tell some "war" stories. You'll laugh and buy him another round and then ask him about a prospect or two. Eventually, he'll be texting you from a "Directional Polytechnic A&M" pro day about a 40 time.

Tweet that out and watch the retweets roll.

Don't pretend that the teams don't benefit here as well...in more ways than just libation.

Individual scouts would never want it to be known they're too chummy with the media. Front offices are always supposed to be more locked down than they normally are, and "leaks" can mean a lack of trust and accountability.

Yet, those same scouts want people to listen to their opinions, and while (usually) it's just good-natured and being helpful, it's not unheard of for guys or even teams to try to create buzz or silence it with ulterior motives.

This too happens perhaps more rarely than people think.

Whenever something negative comes out about a prospect, people jump to the conclusion that some other team is trying to submarine their stock so they can have a shot at them. This happens, but not like we're led to believe by the umpteen times it's written every draft season about almost every negative report.

Again, to Bridgewater's knees...

Do you really think that one team generated all of that just to get him to fall? No team is that coordinated or that good. In fact, too many reporters will double-check reports like this with their own usual contacts that it's possible a certain few scouts on just about every team had similar concerns. We'll just never know which ones on which teams.

Smoke?

Sure, sometimes. Just as often, though, it's an opinion that...like certain other things, everyone has.

This is the game we play every year around this time. It takes a critical eye and a sturdy composition to form one's own opinions, so we'll always rely at least in part on the anonymous scout as he imparts wisdom to the masses.

How much weight you want to put on that is up to you.

Michael Schottey is an award-winning NFL National Lead Writer for Bleacher Report and a writer for Football Insiders. Follow him on Twitter.