I've seen two things here: People getting too optimistic about the quality of candidates, as you say, but also people in entry level positions with entry level

I've seen two things here: People getting too optimistic about the quality of candidates, as you say, but also people in entry level positions with entry level knowledge dismissing basic interview questions outside of their aptitude as "useless leetcode/whiteboard coding". I've seen someone say they have never used a linked list, not even implemented themselves but used, and, on top of that, that they likely never will. I've also seen someone putting down the most basic knowledge about the most simple data structures (i.e. simple questions about what you can and cannot do efficiently with an array) as "premature optimization". That thinking worked for their job, so they thought that's universal.