Is it not possible to have good posts with high payouts and no comments?

No, I don't think that's possible, not organically anyway.
Sure, there could be 100% votes from for example @theycallmedan, @blocktrades and @smooth, leading to a high payout value without them commenting on it; in theory that is. But I highly doubt them to upvote content to which nobody else engages with either.
So no: high organic payouts without any engagement is extremely rare if not impossible.