They could, but the optics of such an action would be really, really bad. Moreover, my gut feeling is that most researchers that use sci-hub could obtain most o

They could, but the optics of such an action would be really, really bad. Moreover, my gut feeling is that most researchers that use sci-hub could obtain most of the papers through their employer's subscription anyway. It's just that the UX of Sci-Hub is so much better.