Imagine what it would be like to do that your whole life and never find any really significant discovery. I guess one may be tempted to rationalize an exciting back story for what they do find. Making the the detachment necessary to look for evidence falsifying such notions very difficult.
Ahem, (cue swelling background guitar music, adopt Darryl Worley voice), actually, it sounds like Life to me. It ain't no fantasy ...
(Clears throat, /Darryl Worley voice) Ah, yes, anyway. Sure it would be tempting to fake a significant find, and garner all the prestige and accolades that had previously been so elusive. But man that's hard to do.
If you think you're a skeptical observer, that's nothing compared to the scrutiny that a scientific review gets. It's not the press that has to be convinced; we all know of their clueless gullibility. It is one's peers that have to be convinced. They're a tough crowd. Look at the treatment of Pons and Fleischman over their claims of "cold fusion".
You can't just make stuff up, even if you're tempted to do so. That's probably harder than the science.