I'm on the jumbo and can hand fly as much or as little as I like, so not sure where that hand-flying comment comes from
You might find you're in a minority these days. Not many hand fly jumbos about. But in any case, there's little doubt that those who find flying the plane as the main draw to the career would find the greater frequency of shorter sectors to a larger variety of (often smaller) fields, more fun than longhaul.