In general I could get to like this feature (not that I ever use maximized
windows personally), but the one thing that really bugs me about it is the
way the window generally ends up nowhere near the pointer when you pull it
away from the top of the screen.  This not only looks and feels broken, but
rather restricts where you can place the newly-freed window, since you
can't move the pointer off the screen :)

Couldn't we make it so that when the window is pulled free, the centre of
its titlebar is initially positioned under the pointer?  This would
probably mean that part of the window would lie off-screen to start with,
but if you drop it at that point it's your own fault really :)