If background-clip was more specific then yes, it would be useful! There needs to be a way to specify coordinates to which a background layer clips, not just just what edge it should cut off at.
For instance, if you want an image to cover all but 10px on all sides but 30px on the bottom you might use: background-clip 10px 10px 30px 10px.
I would also like to be able to use only subsections of an image as a background. Is this what you meant by ‘sprites’? If I use different images for the corners, sides, and background of a block then I would like to be able to save them all in one image file and specify rect coordinates for where each piece is defined.
A background-flip: [horizontal | vertical] attribute would be killer.