Getting something right that the franchise has often failed at.

[pookha]

Interestingly, TOS has MORE incompetent/crazy/et al ship commander stories than any other Trek.

Yep. That's the way I see it too. Mainly to reinforce how great Kirk was mainly. Although they were usually his heroes, who's "exploits were required reading at the Academy". With some many to list, it only reinforced how Kirk was a lousy judge of character.

VOY

can't think of any

Ransom. Who was willing to sacrifice as many members of an alien race as needed, to get the Equinox crew home.

ENT

can't think of any

Archer was mostly out there on his own, because of the nature of the Warp 5 breakthrough.

In Silent Enemy, there's a joke he and Trip share about somebody named Duvall, getting his own command. Archer remarks he's glad to be many light years away. Probably nothing more than idle gossip, until a future novel elaborates.

there were other ships in starfleet.
they get mentioned from time to time and we even see some others like intrepid with captain ramirez comes to the aid of enterprise in the expanse episode.

duvall gets mentioned as one of the people in first flight.

i dont think decker belongs in the list of bad captains.

to me what they were going after was more a but the grace of god goes i.
it hits kirk hard to see decker in the shape that he is in.
it comes across that kirk had respected decker and spock even refers to him as a friend of kirks.

you see a glimpse of what decker was in his logs.what the enterprise crew sees is the remains of a man who had to live with possibly one of the few mistakes of his career but a very deadly one.
it looks like he had been there for days alone on that ship.

as for garth he was hurt and it is possible his madness came from the injuries plus the treatment to save his life.


as for the good commanders so many of the other starship captains we dont meet or if so only in passing.

and then there is wesley., good thing he was good at being a commander or kirk and company would have been dead.