It's pretty clear that this kid has been leveraging ND for a long time now just to get NIL money elsewhere and is likely the type of kid that wouldn't stick even if he came, but...
Freeman needs to make those decisions.
My guess is he told the players that Peyton was out, but did so in a way that the players thought they had some agency over the decision when really it was already made. That's how good leaders handle these situations.