All the other generals who preceded him had the same resources, and all save Meade failed miserably using them. I can't think of any of the other generals who had the knowledge, leadership ability AND personality to survive the politics that Grant had or developed.
They were indeed incompetent, and it showed in spades. Like I said I take nothing away from General Grant, his leadership played an important part for sure. Once the right leadership was employed it made the resources available to him even more of an advantage for the North. Had he not had those resources available to him, we may well have seen a different outcome. One cannot separate his availability to resources, which I contend was the real deciding factor.