When one thinks of E-Sports, a MMORPG isn't the first genre that comes to mind.

One can't help but think that Blizzard sees dollar signs and increased longevity in making World of Warcraft a mainstay in e-sports competition.  Hell it worked for Counter-Strike.  

There are several problems with World of Warcraft as an E-sport that can and likely will keep WoW from catching on as an e-sport.

1.  World of Warcraft arena matches are not fun to watch.  

A non-player would have no idea what is going on or what the rulesets are.   You can watch a game like Madden or Street Fighter being played, have no idea what the mechanics are of the game, yet still know who is winning or losing, and even equate what's going on to real life experiences.  Most people know what a hail mary pass is, or they can tell when Ryu just punched someone in the face.  How many non-WoW people know what the hell frostshock is, what it does, or why it's important?

 Even for a player, it's difficult to tell when a class uses a distinct move due to how generic the animations are.   Hense the reason for scrolling combat text.   

2.  World of Warcraft players did not start playing the game at launch in hopes of it being an esport. 

Most of the player base isn't even on board with blizzards plan to turn World of Warcraft into an e-sport.   It seems that many players just want to have fun and raid with friends, or do world PvP.  These sentiments are often brushed aside, as the players are told 'If you don't like it, don't arena!', but arena based nerfs breed resentment among the player base that perceives that they're no longer valued due to their playstyle.

3.  Blizzard can not manage to balance the classes.

It's become glaringly obvious that Blizzard has no obvious overall theme as to how they nerf and buff classes.  Design rules such as 'clothies are easier to kill!' or 'Melee should do great damage but be kiteable' have been thrown out the window.  

On the tournament realm, the following is a list of classes used worldwide that made it to the top 20

28 Rogues
22 Warriors
19 Mages
16 Locks
7 Hunters
7 Shamans
1 pally

4.  Class, Spec, and Gear all mean more than skill in the arena.  

It has been said many times before, but a fair game would not give material advantages to one player over another.  Put very simply, in a truly competitive environment, a player would be able to pick a new Class, Spec, and Gear without having to invest 300+ hours.   Time invested should not count for anything in a fair game.

If Blizzard really wants to continue down this path, they should hire someone who has either designed games to be played in a competitive environment, or at least played in a competitive environment.  Pardo, Kaplan, and Chilton were all MMO players, and basically professional MMO raiders before working at blizzard.  They are all out of their element.  The best thing they could do is go out and hire someone with some experience in balancing a game for tournament play.  I'd suggest someone from the fighting game community, the best would probably be David Sirlin who's written about world of warcraft before.  

If he cannot be had, Blizzard should go through the whole Street Fighter community and pick up a player who's won some tournaments and plays WoW (ie, John Choi, Alex Valle, or even a lesser known player). Some of these guys are already in the  gaming industry as designers and know more about game play balance for tournaments than a bunch of ex-everquest raid jocky's.  

Hell I'm available for the right price.  Uhh oh, now I'm seeing dollar signs, just like blizzard!