The Swoosh TC situation is all about who has leverage. Smith, Taylor, and to a lesser degree Schumacher have leverage now: full time college jobs (Smith did when this deal was being hammered out) and top-flight athletes. If Nike said "Sorry Mike, only Nike athletes" he could just say "No thanks, I'll keep my old job and continue working with the biggest rising star in American distance running." Ditto for Taylor, though her advantage is more in numbers vs. one or two hyper-stars (for now). I strongly suspect Nike went to Ed Eyestone and he DID say "no thanks": Eyestone + Taylor would be the obvious Provo co-coaching setup, and it's the only location with just one coach. And Ed has insane leverage, of course.
Also, let's not forget about Grant Fischer, who can single-handedly veto any Nike rule about who gets to be your coach.
Nike basically traded leverage now for leverage later. Hence the "no Nike athletes after contracts are up." After LA28 they are going to re-evaluate their groups anyways (just like they did after Paris) and there's going to be a ton of reshuffling among athletes, groups, and coaches. That policy is a bit of a hedge to give Nike more power in four years, if it does want to set up a more ambitious supergroup.
So yes, this arrangement screws over athletes in '28 to some degree, though keep in mind Nike has probably priced in the fact that Smith and Taylor can walk away in '28 too. For example: picture Lululemon offering Nico an insane contract + Smith his own group post-LA.
