The way I see it is this, the more shit they add now, when the manga is providing them with GOOD opportunities to fill in fights in ways that still manga frames can, is less shit they have to pull COMPLETELY from their ass when the anime catches the manga and they have to create entire episodes.

So given the choice between crappy filler episodes with lame plots to compliment their meaningless battles, and filler fight material for battles that actually take place but the manga doesn't bother to show, I'll take the latter.

EDIT: Whoa, did they add new ranks? I don't remember being an Anbu Captain before.