I'm coming to that conclusion as well. I see people check-raise only when they flop sets all the time and get no action because it's obvious they have a big hand. The fundamental thing is that people just don't give much action in NL HE unless they have at least a strong top pair, so you might as well bet into them with something bigger to entice them to play such a holding too hard, rather than get that one little continuation bet out of them when they miss the flop and fold to your check-raise.

It contrasts so much with limit HE, where you check-raise all the time to kill the pot odds behind you and get heads up with the bettor. Indeed, you often do this in limit when you know you are beat to increase your pot equity by forcing hands like middle pair and an overcard to fold. I am still intrigued so often that limit HE and NL HE look so much alike but actually have almost nothing to do with each other.