Like it or not, that trick's specifically enshrined and established in the Constitution. That same document Scalia claimed to defend to vigilantly. Probably there for good reasons.
Again, I'm hardly a scholar of the US Constitution, but if the excerpt of the Federalist papers by Hamilton quoted by Wikipedia[1] is anything to go by, the reason is very clear: to allow for an appointment which "might be necessary for the public service to fill without delay" while the Senate is in recess. That it allows for this trick seems like an unintended consequence.
And if the Senate itself is engineering that delay?
See also rules for allowing legislation to become law, or deny same, without explicit action. Pocket veto and default approval can both happen in this manner:
Just just put someone there to gavel in each day and they are technically in session.
Ironically the court itself ruled that is perfectly okay to do.
Senate is the ultimate politics slimebowl of tricks, they are master level.