I, too, prefer to book flights directly with the airline and usually avoid booking flights through portals. But I have a couple of short, straightforward trips coming up that might be suitable and that I would be willing to book through the Chase portal in return for the UR payout.

This is a sign of a good promotional offer imho, in that it is persuading me to change my normal behavior. It would be great to see substantial bonus offers like this continue. By contrast, the $5 off $100 worth of utility charges that I've received on a couple of non-UR cards is such a small payout that it's almost insulting . . .