EASY. They opened the doors wide open for me. Who at that point had no experiences and never even made a game yet.
I feel the likes of The Letter, Meme Run & U CRAFT dev (though never ever completing it) caused too much drama and sullied the "good name" of eShop and made them take this really weird position. Except, they are outright denying bigger indies. Like Axom Verge...
That last one been cleared up at this point since it's getting a release on the Switch, including a physical copy at retail. Not sure what NoA's reasons would be for not approving it sooner, but perhaps they saw how quickly Blaster Master Zero was coming out and thought that there were enough similarities to pump the brakes for just a little bit on AV until that game had its time to shine.