I haven't seen those discussions, but I can guess what the feeling is. I've been thinking about RTJ recently, frankly partly because of that GW article about RTJ2 and Rees.
I think he did more good than harm. & I believe that characterization itself is typical of RTJ and the kind of influence he had.
Take what might be his most significant contribution: elevating the role of GCA to a profession. This resulted, for instance, in an unfortunate sense of imposing an identifiable "style" upon sites he, er, handled. But it also made the building of golf courses a viable proposition, creating a new industry.
Another thing to keep in mind: for me, and I suspect many of us American golfers -- if there's one architect whose work I encountered more than any other's in traveling around, it's probably RTJ. And given that his most productive period produced so many courses that golfers of "our" generations (aged 35-75) played, I think it's easy to put the blame on him for a lot of what the modern era has wrought which we now regret.
And to be fair, most any other architect with ambitions his size would have done worse, and in fact since his decline, many have.
Finally and maybe more important -- he could often be magnificent, and had a great, intuitive sense of "punishing the almost-good shot" (probably somewhat reined-in, to please his masters) -- while at his worst he was still pretty darned good.