I've never seen it either but that's irrelevant. The original guy talked about someone blocking a crap project with good results. That's a positive.
So someone responds by assuming it's a negative: "...applaud an underling who usefully twisted the knife". I mean maybe, but quite possibly maybe not. But some people seem wired to find the worst.
It's a save-the-budget kind of thing. By showing that we don't need X or can delay buying Y for 1 year, saved the company from $ZZ million dollars of spend. It might not be stopping other people from working, but it is praised.
It's also possible that people are getting praise for these sorts of "negative accomplishments" in private, or on performance reviews. Which is better than nothing, but I think it's still valuable and healthy to remind people that part of the job isn't just building stuff, it's also making sure the right things get built. And public praise for killing bad things is a good way to do that.