If this is really a problem, why not just lock the article at a stub with a few verifiable facts? How is this more editorial work than deleting, and fighting a subjective battle over notability?
You only need to lock stub articles that repeatedly have people add unverifiable info to them.
Finally, if the pages doesn't exist, then anyone who wants to exercise the "option...to quickly add coverage" doesn't have access to the info that would have been contained in the stub!