F-18 does not have near enough range, nor can it carry the Phoenix missile. The carrier defense role of the F-14 with AIM-54 is long gone and has not been replaced. Nothing to keep Backfires from getting into standoff missile firing range, guess the deep thinkers figured the end of the cold war removed that need.
There was an article on business insider (?) that noted the navy shifted it strategy to bombing land targets as a priority and sacrificed the ability to interdict the backfires and such. Someone’s not thinking.