I call those types of people the Claude Makelele of programming, and for those not familiar with soccer I guess Dennis Rodman would be a close comparison.

Without the likes of Makelele and Rodman teams like early to mid-2000s Real Madrid and the 1990s Chicago Bulls would have had way less trophies and wins (the Real Madrid of that era was even nicknamed galacticos/galactics because of the amount of soccer stars they had among their ranks) .