No.
- I want to send messages to people who are not currently online (having a server stay online for you is a desparate hack and not a solution)
- I want to send media other than text
- I want my messages to be e2ee
- I want presence - e.g. know if someone is available, busy, away
- I want voice/video calls
and many more…
None of these were solved by IRC but by the others you mentioned.
An XMPP developer would likely have been delusional about the protocol he himself developed. But at the time I can assure you XMPP was completely irrelevant. AIM/ICQ/MSN/Yahoo! and maybe IRC were the tools of the day back then.
Because of actual competition (which XMPP had absolutely no part in) multi protocol messengers had their golden age then.