I'm not sure that TT is a great indicator of airmanship, in fact i know it isn't.
Having flown with 5K TT and 20K TT Captains I can say that I have seen a wide variety of abilities and skills not time commensurate. Sometimes the 5K guy is far more on the ball.
Certainly training is a far better quantifiable quality, many accidents equating to pilot error seem to me directly related to the underlying training given (or lack thereof)., gaps that only show during non-normal situations when suddenly everything falls apart like clockwork.