Previously, aircraft absorbed track miles in a holding pattern. Now the miles will still be flown but in the so-called trombone instead of in a racetrack. Vectors will still be applied.
Probably 95% accurate but the trombone allows the order to be ever so slightly fine tuned to allow for some wake turbulence efficiencies as well as allowing having enough aircraft in the right spot to keep pressure on the final spacing. For example, I witnessed a super 'shortcut' to follow another super when there was a 737 in between intitially with the 73 extended downwind. The crux of your point is valid though. The same overall cumulative delay for the entire sequence will be very very close to exactly the same (minus the above as described, so maybe a movement an hour).