Sky was a huge direct parallel to US Postal, and marginal gainz/being cleanz was a huge part of their marketing as well. Like it was big for a domestic audience but everyone who had seen Armstrong just felt pissed in the face a little bit.
And I honestly cannot stress the importance of first impressions enough here. Sky went from being founded in 2010 to completely failing in 2011 to completely dominating the TdF starting in 2012, and that Tour itself was probably the most boring Tour in living memory at that point. Contador was banned, Schleck wasn't there, Cadel Evans washed up instantly after winning in 2011, Nibali was slowly getting better but hadn't hit the levels yet he would hit at Astana, and Quintana would race his first GT in the Vuelta that same year.
Pogacar meanwhile grew into dominance at least somewhat gradually, with his first WTF moment on Planche de Belles Filles being cathartic for many because they had been bored and tiled and PTSD'd by LottoNL Jumbo copying the Sky playbook. He then dominated a year later but at least Vingegaard showed up proving to be a future thread, and right when it might threaten to start being boring, he lost the next two TdFs.
Without Vingegaard and to a lesser extent MvdP, anyone that isn't a one man cycling fan would have been bored out of their mind years ago
And I honestly cannot stress the importance of first impressions enough here. Sky went from being founded in 2010 to completely failing in 2011 to completely dominating the TdF starting in 2012, and that Tour itself was probably the most boring Tour in living memory at that point. Contador was banned, Schleck wasn't there, Cadel Evans washed up instantly after winning in 2011, Nibali was slowly getting better but hadn't hit the levels yet he would hit at Astana, and Quintana would race his first GT in the Vuelta that same year.
Pogacar meanwhile grew into dominance at least somewhat gradually, with his first WTF moment on Planche de Belles Filles being cathartic for many because they had been bored and tiled and PTSD'd by LottoNL Jumbo copying the Sky playbook. He then dominated a year later but at least Vingegaard showed up proving to be a future thread, and right when it might threaten to start being boring, he lost the next two TdFs.
Without Vingegaard and to a lesser extent MvdP, anyone that isn't a one man cycling fan would have been bored out of their mind years ago