You’re missing the big picture.
No, I'm aware of what you're calling the big picture. But I'm looking at it differently than you.
Forget the pros, are there even any D1 players that play like GSG? Maybe 1 or 2? Maybe none?
None that I've seen.
It’s because his game is a dead end and would get crucified at that level. No coach anywhere in the world would teach a junior to play with his technique because it has a hard ceiling. And so when people come on this forum - tips and instruction - and they see a segment idolizing a play style that isn’t taught (for good reason) of course they’re going to react negatively. Now to the extent that you just want to win rec matches by playing endurance defense until you inevitably reach the players who can routinely brush that aside, sure, point taken, you can win Rec matches like this.
And I'm concerned about the rec level since that's what this forum is mainly about. I'm mid-4.5 and I still see MEP types. I haven't seen any at 5.0+.
A certain segment react negatively. And I can't speak for others but I don't idolize his style. I do recognize his strengths as opposed to dismissing his results as anomalies or the result of a weak region.
I think you don't give enough credit to how hard MEP had to work to get to where he is. "...just want to win rec matches by playing endurance defense" I don't think captures the difficulty.
My point that I don't think you're seeing is that
every technique has a hard ceiling, not just MEP's. You can argue that traditional technique has a higher ceiling but not no ceiling.
The other point, which pretty much everyone missed, is that there are multiple ceilings: not only one imposed by technique but another by fitness, mental toughness, etc. The lowest of the ceilings [the bottleneck] will determine how high you rise. So your technical ceiling might be 5.5 but if your mental toughness ceiling is 4.0, that's where you'll plateau. So having a higher technique ceiling is no guarantee of actually achieving that level. And this is borne out by the stats that show only 3% make it to 5.0+.
MEP seems to have found a path that maximizes the various ceilings. Not saying this would work for everyone or that even is appropriate for everyone.
I'll repeat what I stated before: if I started with a beginner student, I'd advise taking the traditional path. I'm not anti-establishment; I just recognize strengths and weaknesses of various styles and I don't dismiss out-of-hand non-traditional styles.