I think it's definitely something to be addressed, and that's part of the reason why many eSports leagues have different online bracketing systems; you get top down look at where you're at and also what you have personally achieved. That sort of balances out the invitationals and cheques that get thrown at people that are good and have been good for a while. That is, of course, much more difficult to implement IRL. Capcom sort of tried it in the past year.. where you could submit any tournament for potential ranking points, but it's really hard to do properly and prevent abuse of the system. Underdog/rookie invitationals would be cool, people love to watch small guys get a taste of blood and follow them through their careers.
I'm not sure if that group has had mainstream exposure (like, ever? Maybe LI Joe?), but I'm not necessarily sure if (no offense, just using this in a relative way) C and D tier players and content creators necessarily need or deserve mainstream shine specifically, it's kind of enthusiast-specific entertainment. In the information age, the cream of the crop will always get the most attention and those below will only get noticed by enthusiasts, and that's a super risky game to play no matter what.
Depends on how deep coverage goes, but I think you really have to watch a shit ton of streams/content per week to even hear about a lot of those guys. I love Megaman Steve. Not only is he an informative commentator, but he's a great player and technician and I think he's been a notable Marvel personality and a piece of the NYC Marvel 3 atmosphere and jigsaw puzzle. But if Marvel was to start getting eSports coverage tomorrow, would they profile him? Should they? I may also be rambling here.
light work compared to what they got at Pearson breh