They blew up the black market with the 2022 class. They were negotiating against themselves at times. The whole point of Saban and others coming out and vociferously bitching at the time specifically about ATM was because ATM blew everyone out of the water.
The ran into tough times on the NIL side for the 2023 class due to a lack of prep and then some of the money drying up because of a loss of buy-in during last season. They had to pick and choose who they would load up on and Hill and Hicks wound up being the guys. Hill begged off after a visit in which players flat out told him he shouldn't go there. So they lost Hill and traded that for Owens.
This year, Jimbo has been making the "we're going to have a good year and we're so close" pitch and he got buy-in. That buy-in is drying up. The problem for aggies pulling back in this cycle is that Texas and other SEC schools will benefit explicitly and directly from it. ATM has been forced to go nuts with out of the market offers to keep up but if Jimbo keeps tumbling, that might not matter.
We've discussed all of this contemporaneously but a lot of folks aren't able to track all of the seasonal recruiting threads, understandably. I point it out merely to note that nothing is being revised after looking back. We've got a pretty good read on what's happening with them thanks to different folks some of us know both with ATM and in CFB. The Bama game was a turning point and it could have gotten ugly for everyone had ATM won that game. If Jimbo tumbles down to 7-5 or worse, I'm saying all bets are off on their class.