Let's have this fun conversation today 😁 assuming BTC is just entering the space today and was never released in 2009 will BTC succeed like what it has come to be today? Assuming ETH was the first coin and we have every other coins like doge and xrp then BTC now come out in 2022 what do you think will happen?
This is a futile discussion.
But if ETH was indeed the first coin to come out then I think it's quite clear that it would inherit the first mover advantage of BTC and become the primary coin in the cryptospace.
Being first in any field of innovation is extremely important and you get most of the adopters. But I highly doubt that ETH's smart contract capabilities would come out at that early stage without BTC laying the foundations of blockchain tech.