Sure, but when a drive comes off its packaging, and its SMART log is completely empty, to me it means that the drive hasn't ever been completely self-tested, aside from whatever production tests the manufacturer does while putting the drive together.
Still, I do admit that doing a full (long) SMART self-test for a drive can be considered overkill. In most cases, it will go just fine, reports no problems, and nothing suspicious happens with the SMART attributes. To me, on my personal workstation I use all the time, that is worth it for the peace of mind. Like I said earlier, when I build my own machines, I even deburr the stamped metal edges. (It's not being anal or pedantic or perfectionist; it's the small cuts in my fingerpads that I hate, and consider the time and effort worth the results.) I also add sound-absorbing foam and baffles and such, but I'm not sure if that is because I need them, or because I like building that sort of machines. (No, I don't add LEDs; I like my machines silent and unobtrusive.)
For cluster nodes, I usually do SMART tests in parallel on the nodes, as one step in the initial testing process; memtest is another. Those that do not come up immediately, or show issues during initial testing, I do the second-degree teardown-rebuild way, using a know good machine to test the drives. It takes time in the latency sense, but I believe it saves me time, since I can isolate the problem source faster. On a new drive, I'm not sure if badblocks is worth the time. On an used one, I'd say it is; as well as drives from manufacturers like Seagate with some series of drives having lots of DOA units.
A small fraction of hardware is always b0rked on arrival, that's a given. I personally am willing to spend the time to weed the immediately observed ones out as early as possible, even if it takes an extra 24 hours or so (assuming I can do other stuff for that duration, obviously; I'm not going to babysit such tests). Then again, I definitely weigh time spent differently to say a commercial entity which uses the drives for bulk data storage. Your mileage and weights/emphasis may well differ, no argument there on my part!
That is, I do not know what level of testing is appropriate for anyone else, because it really depends. I'm only hoping my wide description of what I do and why gives a sample point others can use when deciding what they think is appropriate for their use cases.