Blanton's belt drive with a general purpose flywheel-on-one-end,
damper-on-the-other crank makes more sense every day.

If there were say 100,000+ Blanton drives out there like there are 4
cylinder direct-drive A/C engines I'm sure there would be many other
issues for our coffee shop discussions. They are the sort of system
that is probably suitable for a fiddling type experimenter, but would
have their own set of problems when put in the hands of the general
pilot expecting 2000 hr TBOs.

There's a lot to be said for simplicity, although I'll admit the
almost-opposed 4 cyl direct drive scheme does have some very subtle
driveline considerations. The second harmonic yaw motion isn't
recognized by virtually any mechanics, even though it probably has a
lot to do with engine accessory and baffling problems.