This is a better trend than the other options in my opinion. Just because it doesn't happen often doesn't mean it's worse.
We saw this with doing the work first and asking for funding after, with the amazing job they did with Hive Ledger integration.
I'd argue most of the other versions have failed to keep their promises or milestones/goals they attempted to hit, although I'm not gonna get into which ones here.
RE: Proposal: Ecosystem Operations, Bizdev and Growth Retrospective