I get your point, my problem though is that the reward for playing in a competitive multiplayer game is the sense of improvement. If you play soccer(or football) because you want to get a gold trophy, you're playing it for the wrong reason. You should be playing soccer (or football) to get better at it, and have fun while you do so, and you get the gold trophy as a bonus reward for your dedication. If you play ranked Lol, you should be playing it to become a better player, and you should use the ranks to show how far you've come. If you are playing ranked for the end of season rewards, you are playing it for the wrong reason.
Now what does this have to do with level grinding? League should be a game of skill. Taking away the power from the player because their account isnt a high enough level is bullshit. The leveling system is meant to give the player an environment of having the player learn the game, but it shouldn't limit them. I shouldn't have to wait until level 18 to get a keystone mastery because I should learn the game with the idea of keystones in mind from the beginning, not when I'm level 18. Not to mention, matchmaking doesn't match people by level, so some players have an advantage over others for having a higher level.
Let's take a game that doesn't do this, such as Dota 2. In Dota 2, the first game you play, is the exact same as what the pros would play (except hero select unless you play cm on you first match for whatever reason). As a result, the game doesn't hide anything from a new player, and everything that they will use and see is right there in front of them. The game tries to teach the player how to use them with tutorials, but it doesn't lock anything away from them, giving them everything they need to know in front of them. This IMO is better than the league system, because it doesn't limit the way you learn the game. You learn through practice, and finding out which hero you enjoy the most through demo hero, instead of what the game tells you to learn. Heck, in Lol, you don't have access to sandbox mode until level 10.
I've heard the argument of "burden of knowledge" thrown around the community and Riot often, and while yes, it can apply, it is a very bullshit argument it is just a step of mastering the game, and depending on the skill rating, you may want to focus on certain parts of the game. For instance, a bronze player might need to focus on laning and getting last hits, but shouldn't really worry about tp ganks and optomizing xp gain, whilst a diamond player who should know how to last hit properly might want to focus on maximizing map movement and learning micro specific tricks like tp ganking, rotations, and effective uses of poking.
**TL:DR ** Lol shouldn't limit the game to new players as it is detrimental to the learning process of a player as it discourages self-learning and restricts the player on how they improve.
