> The hearings in the last 2 days seemed to have Lopez agreeing with the creditors and not Jone's FUAC. Yet, somewhat seemingly out of the blue, he decided to deny the sale.

This is actualy quite common with judges. Or so i heard from Popehat who is a practicing lawyer. What is going on is that the judge is feeling that one side is making a stronger argument, in their opinion, and they then tend to give more procedural leeway to the other side. In order to be, or appear to be unbiased. Then commentators or sometimes even the plantifs interpret it as the judge signaling that the judge is agreeing with them.

Supposedly this is common enough that lawyers get worried if the judge is too “nice” with their side.