Actually rewarding the winner more will cause more players to participate in their servers struggle for the top. Of course the rewards have to be pretty damn good to convince players who do no WvW atm like me. But its going to get lots of players to bite once the rewards are revealed. Then we have to see how things shake out.
And i dont think your analogy of the fan in the stands works. The players rewarded are those in competition so try to find somthing where the person is actually competing and not a random draw. Because the people you compete against care because they wanted the rewards you won and the people you compete with care because they can now celebrate with you with the rewards you won together.