Most of it has been said.Tthe notable things that caused the bad reputation are weight ( a lot of mid/late 70's fenders are very heavy), design changes like the three bolt construction and the fact from 1973 they increased their production from around 40,000 instruments a year to around 150,000. You could figure that with such an increase quality control is likely to suffer, whether it's sourcing good/consistent quality woods to less attention in the build process.
On the other hand, P basses from 1972 have a great reputation as they changed to a slimmer neck profile that year.