I think any of the bar lengths are viable, it just depends on the person and what they're doing, and how they usually work a tree. I'm not a fast climber so i rarely climb around much with the saw running, and i very rarely 1 hand stuff, if i do it's usually to trip a larger piece as i avoid the rigging so it's buried in a cut already so i don't notice balance as much. Most trees around here that i do are spreading hardwoods over stuff, and pppp i usually have to manage most of the wood in some way. The vast majority of my smaller cuts that i catch/ throw i do with a silky sugowaza, which is over 16" by itself. It's the one designed for line clearance and for me its faster to use rather than starting a saw on small wood (3" or so), and easier/ safer to manage the piece afterwards, pretty amazing saw and it's clear that it was designed for line clearance.
Now that i have a little battery 12 that may change, it's obviously slower than a gas saw but it's super light and really quick to start cutting since you simply push a button and cut, and i don't have to listen to the saw idle the whole time and deal with more fueling stops like i would if the saw was idling a bunch. But for the stuff i would 1 hand I'm usually just using the hand saw, it makes handling the wood so much easier once it's free and it's surprising quick. Any bigger wood than 3" that I'm gonna manhandle i simply snap cut it, no need to 1 hand that stuff either. Even in a lift it's my main tool for dealing with the brush by hand, and I'll even go so far as tripping larger rigged pieces with it if i think it'll be safer/ easier, it's amazingly nice to have a handsaw that is big enough to really cut relatively quickly.
I like a 16" bar and use it probably far longer than i should because it's lighter than a bigger saw, and i can usually get back to where I'm gonna flop it by using only 1 saw. I need a midsize saw (especially now that I'm not there physically anymore, it'll be a requirement before i start my business back up), but thus far i simply jump up to my 80 cc with a 24" bar, the bigger wood goes fast compared to the more labor intensive tips where I'm dealing with more pieces. I don't like double cutting, if anything I'll cut the side to fit the smaller 16" so an 18" or 20" on a midsized saw simply isn't gaining me much in reach. Although the 16" bar likely isn't the best performance, for me it's been a good compromise with how i work a tree.
. When I was his age, I was sitting in a European history class in college.
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