Ness's recovery is considered worse because of how punishable it is. I also feel like Doc can't be on the list simply due to the priority his up-B has and he covers his recovery decently with pills.
In terms of most low-tier characters, you need to be prepared to lose to someone you are better than if they use strong characters. It's even worse once they are your practicing buddy, because they get used to what you do so they can make reads AND they start understanding the tools that you have. It gets really ugly really fast, but if you are good enough, you can usually still have close games. I have some pretty close games with some pretty good Midwest players, and others I just get stomped by. When you choose to play a low-tier, sometimes your goal is to just push the character as far as Hax pushed Falcon (and even farther). Who knows? You might end up winning some stuff anyways. And you can have fun doing it.
Also, really good showing by Vrud. He did really well on stream and I enjoyed watching him. It was like a breath of fresh air to see a low-tier on screen.