well tbf most Tough Love had quit before first TC, we played close to 2 years of mop, I guess certain guild dodgin us for like a 6 months+ and only getting 1 premade vs rest of the best so combined with people just quiting for real life reasons that was never rly a factor. a lot of pugs back then was super competitive tho, early mop had some of the best pugs of all time with multiple strong guilds queuing up, having premadetier comps on both side with a lot of focus on mid.
The scrambled plebmades also held high standard + the kills in mid where not dependant on meele rng, more back n forth pure caster stuff, that all helped with general synergy in order to even land kills imo.
shit was cash money. not to say ciren is correct about the issue now tho. This expansion is totally different and the only classes that really benefit from playing pugs on the regular is like druids n hunters and to a certain extent heals. rest benefits way more from premades/plebmades imo.
I do think if legion is decent then getting strong groups to queue up against eachother would be useful.