The search for a brushless motor continues... DMM got back to me today (on a sunday btw very impressed) they can sub out the absolute encoder for an incremental one. I read the spec sheet for it, which might have solved one problem and created another. It has hall sensors in it that it uses for some kind of control algorithm. Not sure if these signals are accessible or not, waiting on a reply back.
Downside is that its a differential encoder, another option the board does not have. Have to go back and re-read but I vaguely remember being able to still use just 2 channels of it.