I suppose that by "check the type" you mean try to use the value and hopefully catch the error if it didn't work :P
I'm not sure what your point is, are you saying that there are cases where the idiom is useful? Sure, so are some of the things strict complains about, that's what no strict is for. But if you only used it for one object, there's a chance you only used the idiom once right? If a language has a syntax that is a little cumbersome for a bad practice that can be useful in some rare edge cases, that's not really a language flaw.