I had a guy (a bit of an assclown to tell you the truth) tell me he leaves his snare loose when not playing in order to reduce wear and tear. All I can tell is it seems to cause the snare to touch the bottom head when you want to play it without the snare engaged. He also lowers the top hi hat cymbal (which may indeed make some sense) and doesn't play with spare sticks laying on top of his bass drum for similar reasons.

Anyone care to weigh in with an opinion?