I do agree with some points you made, but not all.

Pickup is supposed to be natural. The routines/negs/lines you learn might do nothing to a guy who just started pickup, but it's way better running routines and lines than buying her a drink and watching her die out of boredom. New beginners usually start out by looking like social robots, running one line after the other and memorizing every single step. At first, it makes them look awkward and weird. However, the more they interact, the more they learn and the better they become.

The process of pickup is not about memorizing what to say and delivering it like a presentation, it's a process of learning what works best for you and what doesn't. It teaches you to overcome the anxiety that comes from approaching, to tease girls, flirt with them and a lot of other stuff that normal guys who never studied pickup usually don't know about.

And who told you that guys who are good with girls never studied pickup? I'd reckon that most, if not all, of them have read/studied pickup but they usually hide it from other people so they don't look "awkward" as you say.

I personally had a girlfriend that I loved a lot before I entered pickup. I had a large social circle, a lot of great friends and was living the perfect university life (as in getting laid before getting a girlfriend, going to parties 4-6 times a week and scoring a high GPA). My life was perfect, according to me, before I entered pickup. This journey of pickup made me even stronger. Knowledge is power, and the more you learn, the more you improve.

Your friends are definitely doing something wrong, but they'll notice it sooner or later. If you can help them, I suggest you do that too. They're your friends, and that's what friends do, they help each other out.

I have a lot of guy friends who used to fail at interacting with women. We'd go into a club and all they would do is group together and start staring at the girls. I told them to read a book on pickup and gave them some good books I've read. They started developing motivation, and with that motivation and experience, they started scoring once in a while, and I can still see them improving daily and I'm happy for them.

I hope this explained my opinion on the matter in an understandable way.