“..Eyeball to eyeball dog fighting, I can see it happening easily...”
The F-16 is no slouch, especially when the F-35 pilot is wearing high heels. /s
I live near Tyndall AFB and run into F-35 pilots. They are sharp and motivated, but they wonder what is missing or what is flawed in the airplane. They get the intel briefings on enemy aircraft comparisons, but they wonder how much is just BS spouted by people who would never say an unkind word against the airplane the politicians get kickbacks to support. Pilots are also TDY here, so they have to stay until training is complete. Downtime sucks for them.