Back to what wronoj said - freshmen have no PT expectations, so why would the assistant coach email you? When a sophomore or junior are short on PT you get periodic emails from them, but you can do whatever you want with a freshman, essentially.
Also, as of a few seasons ago, the benefit of the whole "take it off and put it back on again" routine with redshirts was taken out of the game by seble. So I have a hard time seeing that he didn't like the RS the first time, then the second time he was cool with it. Based on seble's change in this area, he never would have been happy with the RS.