Which we already established, typically OP does not need help by the time an update comes out.

Well, they definatly don't need an inbox flooded with crazy comments. Plenty of update posts were calm and collected. There were plenty of others that were crazy clusters of madness.

I fail to see how disallowing updates all together does not solve the problem of updates being derailed.

Because people still want updates. The discussion isn't being barred. It is just being moved to a more appropriate place.

I also think the community does a great job at downvoting irrelevant posts, and having rational discussions in most posts.

Sometimes it works well, other times it doesn't. For whatever reason, I can't explain why, update threads were particularly bad at rule violations, derailing discussions, and end up being the opposite type of discussion this sub should be about.