More Words, Deeper Hole

That's the rub--influence. Scalia was highly intelligent, extremely well-written, and had an exceptional legal mind. (Just because he used those gifts for evil doesn't mean they weren't there.) I am sure that he was able to pull the other conservative justices even more to the right than they would be naturally, and now that force is gone. He was also an incredibly aggressive questioner during oral arguments, so that process will likely be very different in future cases. Scalia's death affects A LOT more than the likely vote split.