Could be. If I was Jellico and you were Riker, I might have conceded to your point. Personally, I wouldn't have changed to 4 groups anyway. I still say it doesn't warrant Riker's behavior. Two things in particular:
- Not making a change directly ordered by your captain and instead waiting to see if he'd enforce it later. If the order was potentially bad for readiness, delaying only made that worse.
- Sulking about it and making your captain jump through hoops to get your assistance.
Jellico might have had experience with making this change in similar timeframes with good success. I would guess it is his preference for a reason. Still not saying it's the decision I would have made.
As a final note, many of us like Riker sometimes or are at least familiar with him. Before this episode, we don't know Jellico and he comes off brash. That may be influencing our overall opinion of how the episode is perceived. We usually don't like it when someone barks orders we disagree with and we have to follow them. I've never served, but my understanding is that's a pretty common experience in the military. Riker's behavior wouldn't usually be tolerated in the military, especially in a crisis and especially from someone in a leadership role.
I'm assuming that was a legacy choice. It did look ridiculous in a late 80s backdrop, though. I'm also glad they changed it up.