I think this misses the point about the sorts of team players these companies are trying to get, who are usually decent solo programmers but who also are often

I think this misses the point about the sorts of team players these companies are trying to get, who are usually decent solo programmers but who also are often fun, light and friendly, actively work to build trust with a team through socialization, promote good practices and patterns and don't begrudge the fact that a portion of their day is to be spent in meetings, reviewing others' code and generally communicating. These people exist, I've met some of them. I've met some of their opposites too, who are usually more quiet, sometimes cranky people who just want to be left alone all the time, and I can definitely see why the former is more attractive from a management perspective. There probably are tens of thousands of developers readily available who say they like to work in long uninterrupted blocks, and who will be happy to just own something like a dog with a bone before they throw it over the fence for others to look at, and I just don't think that's that special in a person - I think most humans like to work this way naturally, so when you talk about this to a hiring manager or team lead, I can certainly imagine why they aren't energized by the prospect. Also, you have to remember that these people aren't naive, and have probably seen enough staff and candidates to suspect that this sort of description is a cover for general irritability or other personality qualities that interfere with team harmony. Also, in my experience, in a company that's scaling, with software with lots of interlocking pieces and projects large enough that an individual can't tackle them solo, these people tend not to do so well when compared to "social developers", I would imagine.