I didn't read Dan's post as anti-raw data flying, as some did; I understood the irony to be some pilots are using raw-data flying to practice for the sim.
The sim is there to practice for real-life; it's the place to make the mistakes. Any mindset which suggests the opposite is unfortunate and is far from ideal in a professional & safe culture.
By all means practice hand-flying when appropriate (and I do), but not just becasue you have a sim coming up! In parallel with Old Smokey's post, in the same way we should revise our EFATO (and other) non-normal profiles for day-to-day operations, not just because we have check coming up.
This check-minded mentality can be detrimental, since once the pilot gets out of the sim, he is prone to relax: "another one done for 6 months!", when in fact the opposite ought to be the case!