The bench press isn't "terrible" by any means. Most of the issues that arise come from people being prolific benchers, and... very little else The imbalances that develop are probably the biggest contributing factor to injuries. Americans (and maybe people everywhere) have this weird obsession with benching. I've been there, and done that. I can remember my high school years being a virtual bench pressing machine. Now that I am older and wiser (at least by some small margin, wiser) I have all but given up on the bench press. Currently I hit the bench once a month, never going for a maximal effort. For chest work I stick with pushups and dips at this stage. Will that make me a world class bench presser? Nope. In fact I can tell you that my bench press max has dropped a good bit.

Going forward, if someone wanted to bench, I think that considerable attention needs to be paid at building great stability in the shoulder girdle. Rows, overhead pressing, prehab movements, etc. At the point where your shoulder girdle recieves proper attention, benching should be fairly pain/injury free. How much and what kind of attention will be very individual.