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This is most relevant for my Con Law class. My prof does a lot of work in international and foreign relations law—especially regarding constitutional issues. He really briefly mentioned his own scholarship when we did cases on executive/legislative assertions such as Curtiss-Wright, Hamdi, Hamdan, etc.

If I have time, is it worth it to read through an article or two by him? If I find anything noteworthy, how should/would I go about incorporating this into an exam response (if it's relevant/applicable of course). Do I just emphasize his theses in a general way ("For example, some scholars have argued..."), hoping he realizes I've read his stuff?

Overall, my Con Law likes to namedrop: his own professors, judges he clerked for, his colleagues, etc. He likes to go into what they think and what he thinks about what they think, etc. So, on the test, I figure it might be a good strategy to namedrop him.

Or am I completely overthinking stuff and this is waste of time?

I did this as a hail mary on an exam I had no business getting more than a B- on, and ended up getting an A. Maybe it was just a hard exam in general, and I did better than I thought I did, but I really think that incorporating something from his research may have given me a bit of a boost (even if it was subconscious on his part).

this is extremely try hard and kiss ass. However, (unfortunately) professors think they are gods and their ideas are flawless, so they will reward this shit. I've known a few people to use bullshit strategies like this and it has always worked well.

Professors only write stuff that they think is correct. If you say something that they've written, you're saying something that you know they believe is correct. They also think they're very smart for writing the stuff that they write, so if you regurgitate their own writing back to them, they'll think you're very smart for agreeing with them. Finally, law professors have huge egos and will probably love reading you quote them. Don't include a professor's writing at the expense of actually answering the question correctly and completely, but if you can, do it.

If you do it, meld the idea or position in a simple way that he will agree with the analysis, but not necessarily know that you are only throwing it into the exam to blow smoke up his/her ass. If you say something like "some scholars argue" or make a blatant attempt to allude to the fact you read their article, well then you're a douche. No one likes an overt and over the top kiss ass. My two cents.