I don't personally dislike Blaze but I always felt Brave New World got a lot better reception due to having Bruce because I think musically a lot of the songs aren't really any stronger than the Blaze albums. I could imagine a couple of the more liked songs on it (whether that's The Wicker Man, the title track or Blood Brothers) with Blaze on vocals and the fanbase would have had a very different opinion on that album I think.
Personally I think The X Factor is pretty cool, Virtual XI isn't as bad as people say. The biggest hurdle for Blaze from my PoV is that Bruce IS the voice of Iron Maiden and that is hard to overcome.
I always forget which songs, but weren't a couple actually written from the Blaze era? I want to say Nomad was one, but I forget.
I believe Adrian Smith confirmed that The Nomad, Dream of Mirrors and The Mercenary were written for Virtual XI. I do like Brave New World quite a bit as an album but that album definitely has a couple of songs that are just as bad as The Angel and the Gambler in terms of repetitiveness and the chorus being used way too many times. Sometimes less is more.
Adrian confirmed those three in an interview where he said there were four, but he couldn't remember the other. He also apparently said that Blood Brothers wasn't the fourth one. But in another interview, Steve said Blood Brothers was partially written during VXI.
So either there are four besides Blood Brothers and the remaining one is unknown, or it's those four and Adrian was just wrong. If there's a fifth song, I'd guess The Thin Line Between Love and Hate, because that's the remaining song on the album that doesn't have a credit for either Bruce or Adrian, but I'm doubtful about that one because it feels very much like it was written for Bruce. The others sound like ones that Blaze could tackle.
Blaze also has said that he wrote some of the lyrics to Dream of Mirrors, and I see no reason to disbelieve that, especially given the band's spotty history with giving proper credit. It seems up his alley in terms of subject matter (and up 'Arry's, too, just to be fair).
On the other point: The Angel and the Gambler rocks. No caveats. It rocks.