UT supported/joined these lawsuits against the NCAA only because, even after getting b**ch slapped by SCOTUS, the NCAA pursued a public campaign against UT specifically. They planted a high-profile story and intended to make an example of UT. Dr. Plowman and the regents had very little choice but to take them to the woodshed.
Having said that, I do think that the UT admin read the tea leaves and knew that they had to get in front of the mayhem, if only from a PR perspective. Once NIL became a thing, it was clear that limiting transfers also became unconstitutional. UT knew it, the NCAA knew it, and most first year law students could have successfully made the argument in front of any court in the US and won.
You can't arbitrarily limit somebody's earning potential by imposing limits on where they can study and "train" for their chosen profession. As long as market forces can freely dictate what an "advertiser" is willing to pay for a "spokesperson's" NIL, then no entity can interfere with those market forces. If the market in Columbus supports a better earning opportunity for Ricky Gibson than the market in Knoxville, then forcing Ricky Gibson to stay enrolled at UT is a non-starter. The transfer rules never applied to other students and were only created to benefit the schools and the NCAA.
You are 100% correct that UT knew this was the end game and has been openly and actively participating in it. We are most certainly going to lose some good players on occasion.
But folks should consider that the only reason that Ricky Gibson had leverage was because McCoy, who transferred here for better financial opportunities, got hurt. And....if we lost Ricky Gibson to the portal, you can be certain that there is another Jerod McCoy somewhere that would gladly take the terms of Ricky Gibson's original deal to come play at UT. No tampering would be necessary.
