I doubt it. Even for ports you can still symlink /usr/ports to $HOME/ports, for Scummvm with --enable-all-engines or Eduke32 (Build/GPLv2 license clash, can't be shared as a binary).
I think they're trying to say is you can just link stuff to $HOME if some filesystem runs out of space (not an endorsement of that view, just an explanation).
/usr/local is not small at all by default.