Would you rather have a long serving 15,000 hour pilot with 10 hours in type.....or a low hour new hire Pilot with 500 hours on type?
Depends - if the 15,000 hr pilot was brought up on steam driven VFR with lever, knobs and pulleys, but the type was a modern glass-cockpited IFR machine in bad weather, and he hadn't really bothered to pay attention during the groundschool etc and was passed by his examiner because he "must be OK with 15,000 hrs" then maybe I would prefer the new hire with 500hrs on type and a good understanding of how all the systems worked, and their failure modes etc.
As Geoffers says, hours is not a good indicator of competance and certainly hours not in the correct role (aviation being very role-specific) is often not very helpful and can be counter-productive. "When I worked for X we did it like this" - X of course being an onshore VFR single pilot company when he is now flying offshore multipilot IFR etc.
But in answer to the original question, as farsouth says, the captain may have very little P1 time when he gets his first command, but he has lots of experience in role and has had plenty of time to study those who did it well, and those who did it badly, when he was a co for 3000hrs.
HC