I believe the chemicals in regular Simple Green are pretty bad for carbide and the tooth brazing.
In in my area (ATL) the framing lumber at the BORGs is almost always better than the specialty dealers. This wasn't always the case, but has been for the last several years.
I don't think it's fair or accurate to lump the pitch problem on BORG wood. It's species specific. We use first growth heart pine every once in a while - something you just can't get at the BORG. It gums up tooling despite being felled over a hundred years ago.