Mzzkc:

To reuse your sports analogy: A player with natural, refined talent who doesn't know the rules of the game is much more likely to make costly errors. Sure they might pull out a win in the end, but is it really worth the risk when they could just hit the books for an hour or two?
Yes. And hitting those books, for far more than an hour or two, is just as critical. I'm talking about developing and adhering to fundamentals here, and not natural talent; that to me requires an enormous amount of work.

So yes again, refined talent based soundly on fundamentals and much hitting of the books will trump blind adherence to technique every time, no matter how clever that technique might be. If your head's not properly in the game, you'll never pull out a win, period.

(BTW, I personally think natural talent is extremely overrated, based on chronic exaggeration, self-delusion, vague memories of childhood dreams that sure seemed lucid, or misinterpretation. Except in cases of poor mental health, natural talent likely does not exist. It also has nothing, nothing, nothing to do with developing the fundamentals).

Unless you're suggesting that the fundamentals can overwrite biological certainty (sleep cycles and what have you). Some knowledge remains necessary to avoid laying in bed for nearly 90 minutes right as bedtime rolls around.
They can and do overwrite biological certainty. Think about it: doing WILD itself literally and intentionally overwrites biological circuitry, in probably a more profound way than conjuring dreams before that 90 minute window elapses.

Aside from that, and the fact that NREM dreaming, as you likely know, is not only a possibility but a very valid goal for advanced dreamers: Yes, I believe that WILD is definitely best done after WBTB, very late in the sleep cycles; My WILD class says this exactly. Again, good timing and technique have nothing whatsoever to do with the fundamentals... I'm not sure how you came to that conclusion, based on what I said.