Lol, somebody needs to look up the definition of PR. Cause it definitely isn't a failed business agreement you had no intention of the public finding out about. If Ryan ran out to the public immediately after they turned MS down and said, "Hey, look at what MS is trying to pull," then yes, it would have been PR for sympathy. But, he had no intention of talking about that business dealing. Instead, how did we find out about it? When Spencer ran to the public to whine about big bad Sony turning down his "very generous" offer. Ryan then later came out just to give the actual details of the deal and state it wasn't a good deal.
What does MS not owning COD, yet, have to do with anything. I guess they shouldn't have even offered the 3 years then, since they don't own it, yet? What a ridiculous statement. This whole thread is about them wanting to purchase it, and what harm that could have on the industry.
And no, this will not be like Minecraft. A game, BTW, that doesn't have a native PS5 version and is only available through B/C. If they ever release a next gen version, will they also release one for PS5 is a good question. Anyway, Spencer and Ryan's talk about the deal already showed MS's hand. They are going to keep it on PS5, but there are no plans to continue supporting PS after this gen. But, I guess you can join those who pretend that MS will always keep it on PS, because that would help the deal go through.
As someone correctly stated earlier, MS could have this deal go through tomorrow if they just announced and signed an agreement that they were going to spin off COD into it's own branch. They would work independently of MS/Xbox, and continue to publish on multiple platforms. Sony did this with Bungie and the deal went through very quickly. The fact that MS doesn't want to do this telegraphs their intentions more than anything. I'm sure it peaked the interest of the CMA, as well.