I agree with your assessment of him, but the reason his name is being booted around so much isn't just because those secretly (Or not) rooting for the Democrats think he'd get bitchslapped so handily in the general election. A significant part of the GOP is the same DC-to-Boston Northeast-corridor Ivy League smarterer-than-everyone-else people who own the Dem leadership, who share almost all the same values with those Dem leaders except they are more invested in private enterprise and paying fewer taxes. These are the guys who own whatever allegedly-Conservative mainstream press there may be (Mainly FOX, the DC Times, and NR). And so, they also control the mikes, and what they put out is also the inputs to the rest of the MSM on 'What those damned Republicans are doing.' The media is kind of an inbred self-pollinator that thinks Philadelphia is somewhere out around Chicago, and is basically devouring their own waste and spewing it back out on this.
I don't pay a lot of attention to Ann Coulter (because she does a magnificent job in selling herself and her books, rather than espouse a conservative philosophy), but it would be interesting to gauge what she and Krauthammer and Rove and the rest of the DC-to-Boston Northeast-corridor Ivy League smarterer-than-everyone-else GOP jugheads spew on Christie.
It's still way, way early for virtually any candy-date and besides the points you're making and the setup that sure to happen (Christie getting kneecapped should he even come close to getting the nomination), I see the whole Christie thing as being just One Great Big Trial Balloon, aka the Hindenburg.
Christie, a classic gas-filled douchebag, will probably explode of its own volition, but it's still fun watching the all-too-predictable media circus at play.