Having been in this business almost 40 years, as an IC and a manager, I think you are right. Some of the worst managers I've had (for the team and product) have been excellent coders. One of the best managers I ever worked for was not an engineer. As you say, it's all down to the individual.

When I'm a manager, I never expect to be in the weeds with the code my team is writing. Again, as you said, my responsibility is to hire a team I can rely on. Sure I understand 70% of what they're doing because I'm an engineer, but that doesn't matter. My role is not to code but to hone the team and act as a boundary or servant manager to keep the team from the political BS. I wish more companies would realize this.