* a group of mediocre architects could have built a better dome in Florence than Brunelleschi
* a group of mediocre stock pickers could have outperformed Buffett
* a group of mediocre designers could have built a better computer than Jobs
* a group of mediocre basketball players could have beat Jordan in the NBA finals
* a group of mediocre humanitarians could have had a bigger impact than Schindler
when the truth is:
* Brunelleschi did not lay the 4 million bricks of the dome, a large team did that
* Buffet outperforms the average stock picker by about 13% to 20%, it so happens that in the financial business 13% to 20% is a big deal, while 13% to 20% better is not disruptice startup-level improvements
* Jobs never built a computer, he needed to lord power over a large team to do that
* I believe that a team of 5 mediocre players could easily beat a team of 1 Jordan
* 1 Schindler saved 1200, while 2 million mediocre Nazis killed about 9 billion who they felt where ethnically inferior. In this case, I think the mediocre Nazis had a bigger impact.
So while my heart tells me to believe in the point you're trying to make, that one alpha engineer is worth a ton of mediocres, the examples do not support that point.