Rating requirements are fine, I'd say..

The first PvP honor point system required time. Loads of time, seas of time! But other then time, nothing. You just needed time, time, time.

That system sucked. It just did.

Arena's changed that. Needing only 10 games to receive points each week allowed even the more casual people to gather some gear and actually compete. The fact everyone is now in PvP gear is -not- a bad thing. If you think it is, then you have to re-evaluate your idea of PvP! *nodnod*

Anyhow, the personal rating required for the top notch of the arena gear is just the reward for the people putting enough time and devotion in it to be succesful. Whilest the more casual players will just have to do with lower tier arena gear. This isn't a bad thing, the essential difference between s1 and s3 for example, it's there, but someone in full s1 still stands a fair chance against someone in s3. The gap is there, but not as immense as it used to be. If you can't reach the rating to get the top notch stuff, then that's just your loss. For the ones that does reach it, will then have an actual reward to show for it.

So, in a nutshell, the pvp systems blizzard brought since TBC (granted with a few glitches and bugs, but the idea in essence!) is a very good one! It is able to satisfy -all- of the players out there, be it casual or hardcore. While keeping the general PvP environment as balanced as possible, without going too green to give everyone -exactly- the same gear. More effort = better, but not invincible, gear.