Well, after all that another LGS ended up "finding" some of the current MA-compliant 15Ts and dropped the price to about the same as my primary LGS, so I pulled the trigger on Saturday and picked one up. I figure that the likelihood of them "upgrading" the barrel is slim. As discussed previously, they will most likely either stand pat and keep the 5R barrel as the differentiator or move to the 1:9 barrel vs. going to something like a 1:7 etc. I just saw that they released a new 15-22 in January and it appears to be an entirely cosmetic change from gen 1 to gen 2. Same major components but new M-LOCK hand guards, Magpul flip-up sights, etc. Thinking the T may undergo a similar change for Gen 2...but who knows.