Is Riot prioritizing professional play over normal gameplay?

It's very hard for Riot to find the 'balance point' between balancing the game around professional play and casual play. Every elo has its strong and weak champions, along with strong strategies, which makes game balance extremely difficult for a developer's perspective. It is a position that's really hard and I'll give Riot credit for this.

Unfortunately, as more and more seasons went by, it seems Riot is focused MUCH MORE on professional play than on casual play. If professional play and casual play were on different servers with different numbers, then this would not be a problem. But honestly the balance changes Riot have to put because of the professional leagues is really negatively impacting the normal gamer's experience.

There are VERY explicit examples of this, along with some less explicit changes.

1. The baron and elder buff changes on the PBE. Evidently LCK/LCS times have been long and baron isn't impactful enough in pro play, so they're giving baron and elder drake MASSIVE buffs in the next patch. I think most of you will have seen the PBE baron empowered siege minion video on youtube to see how much of a buff this will be. But honestly, in casual play baron is already extremely snowbally (the game itself is to be frank), where a team can almost guarantee victory with a baron if they were already ahead. Riot even told us in their first blood article that in patch 7.3, the team that gets the first baron has a 81.5% win rate - isn't this ENOUGH of a lead? Sure it's a whole year ago, but would it really change THAT dramatically over the course of 1 year? I bet it's still about 70% or so MINIMUM. The baron changes really seem to ignore the casual gamer's experience just to satisfy the people playing professionally.

2. Ryze, not a champion considered by many to be unhealthy, is going to get ANOTHER nerf because he is too strong in professional play. Well guess what? Poor dude already has a 43.2% win rate in NA platinum. Does he really need to get another nerf just because he's so strong in pro play? Is it honestly ok to leave a champion in the gutter for 50 million+ players for the 1000 or so that play the game professionally? It really isn't. Honestly I'd be happier with him getting another rework, hopefully without the cancerous point and click snare, than him being in this gutter state.

3. Ardent Censer in Worlds 2017. Remember how strong that item was? Remember how strong ADCs, particularly twitch in solo queue, were at that time? Sure they may still be fairly strong but it was MUCH WORSE then. For SIX MONTHS. And Riot adamantly refused to properly nerf that cancerous item, stating that they can't impact the meta much due to worlds. So it was allowed to destroy and dominate casual play for six months until worlds was finally over. Worlds can't be an excuse to leave something that blatantly strong alone, as it is OPENLY embracing imbalance just so that pros don't need to adjust - this is not fair for neither them or casual players.

Here are some less explicit examples - these are huge balance problems in the game but they may not be ENTIRELY due to pro play

1. Viktor has to stay in the 46% win rate gutter (naopgg champions tab) for a whole YEAR because he's evidently too strong in pro play. And the 46% is AFTER the buffs this patch, which didn't alter Viktor's win rate much at all. He got nerfed over and over in season 6 because of how strong he was in pro play, and because of that and the Rylai's nerfs, he's been left in the gutter unchanged for SO.LONG. He didn't even get compensation for getting stacked nerfs due to Rylais at that time. I'm not even sure if Viktor was strong in casual play at that time (meanwhile Kogmaw gets an IMMEDIATE buff after his nerfs but I digress).

2. Lucian getting nerfed over and over into the lowest win rate adc because of how strong lucian mid was in professional.

3. Pre-rework Rek'sai had to get nerfed over and over because of how useful his ultimate was in professional play - won't elaborate as that problem is now solved

4. Riot ALMOST removing both the red and blue jungle items just because of the disparity in pro and casual play.

Frankly, the game CANNOT be balanced around professional play. The game was MADE for people to PLAY, not watch. It has to be based on the casual players that play the game at a somewhat high level, not the extreme minority of coordinated professional play. And yet quite often the live game is shafted in favor of professional play. Not only does this make the casuals feel neglected, but disrespected. How long do Ryze mains and Viktor mains (along with quite a few others) need to play champions in a gutted state just because of the potential they have in pro play? Isn't it unfair for them, along with the players that get matched with them?

Given the recent VERY LOW Riot interaction on these boards, I doubt this will get Riot's response. But if it does, I beg them to reconsider their reasoning. The game should be for the casual players, as it was made for them in the first place. Please, don't shaft the casual player's game to balance gameplay between professionals.

tl;dr over the course of several seasons a lot of balance has been around pro play instead of normal play. This really negatively impacts casual play and this really needs to stop.