Does anybody have any creative ways to deal with the Content Layout Shift caused by CMS/SMT content? Is that even still an issue anymore or is it just the result of my prehistoric version of SCA?

make the place holders for your CMS content the same size as your actual CMS content. That way, when it finally loads, the page doesn't shift. Also, for images in your CMS content, make sure the containers are defined to the image sizes or you'll get more shift when the images finally load. I think webpagetest.com is a good tool to document layout shift frame by frame.

Yeah, that's kind of the conclusion I had come to. Our home page stays relatively static and most things are in a predictable block layout, but I wasn't sure how to account for a text field that can be a variable height when the browser gets narrow based on how much text is in there. We also have a lot of very large landing pages built in the SMT that shift like crazy. I wasn't sure if there was a way to preload the content or buffer it some how before everything loaded. Wishful thinking, I guess...