They are not dumb - just ignorant. The ratings could have been more helpful if they represented (to a percentage of chance, but generally a good chance) how a player will perform. Instead, the ratings look like random picks with strong chance for high ratings as outcomes, hence explaining why many players have more high ratings than average ones. There is even a flaw in the ratings that show on the first page of the profile; it shows the ratings for the league only (as if the player played 5 straight league matches one after the other).
People are bidding like crazy for players even at this stage of the season. Nordeus must be happy with the new transfer system. Ok, they need money, but they overdid it by putting many levels competing each other for the same list of players. They could have put it, L1-L3, L4-L6, and so on, but instead they chose what suits better to greed. They could also have left it as team to team transfer and nordgen to team transfer (but considering the stars only). Let's see how long the crazy bidding will last though. How much longer before many users will be left with only a few tokens?