The pilot is there for stereo decoding, it has nothing to do with the ability to tune to an FM station.
https://wiki.analog.com/university/courses/electronics/elect... has some of the analog approaches collected.
https://wiki.analog.com/university/courses/electronics/elect... has some of the analog approaches collected.
Another fun one, when you have IQ samples, is the polar discriminator: calculate x[t] * x*[t-1] where x* is the complex conjugate, and take the angle with arctan. Feels a bit like magic ("is that all?") but is justified by the theory.