As the draft approaches, more and more media members are trafficking in opinions from anonymous scouts and coaches regarding the players who will be drafted later this week. Our advice this year is the same as it is every year.

Ignore those opinions.

Anonymously-reported facts often fuel journalism, if those facts can properly be verified. Anonymously-reported opinions mean nothing. They can’t be verified or debunked. They’re opinions. Without knowing the biases or prejudices or objectives or agendas of those sharing those opinions without attaching their names to them, what’s the point?

For media outlets, the point is obvious. The stories based on the opinions of anonymous scouts and coaches regarding the pros and cons of incoming players generate clicks and interest and buzz and whatever. That doesn’t make the basis for these stories any less unreliable.