First of all, the 223 Rem is capable of long rifle life regardless of which powder you use. As long as you don't shoot a large volume of sequential shots where the barrel become overheated, barrel life is not something you need to be concerned about with the 223 Rem.
I used ball powder in the 223 Rem, namely H335 and BLC2. The former yielded excellent groups with 55 grain bullets in 12" twist bolt rifles. Yes, it meters very consistently if that is important to you. My main difficultly with ball powders is their temperature instability, especially varmint hunting in 90+ temperatures, Also I experience considerable POI changes from early spring to mid-summer.
This was more pronounced in the 22 250 with H380 than the 223 Rem but enough that it caused me to move away from ball powders all together for rifles.
I stopped using ball powders many years ago. I found, at least for me, that "stick" powders are more consistent. In the 223 Rem, H4895, IMR 4895, Benchmark, and Varget all performed very well for me.
PS: Ball powder did not burn cleaner or produce higher velocities for me as you asserted in your post.