First of all, we need to think about why exactly players create smurfs and in my opinion there is a lot more to it than just get shiny stats for many smurfs. I will give you a little list of what i think are the top reasons to smurf:
#1: stat/elo reset: many of the best players do want to get the number one spot with really nice stats to show off. however, this really only goes for those who seek the challange of preserving an amazing win/loss ratio. i doubt they create any account just to crush new players, it is really just about the challange for them.
#2: playing one deck only on smurf: now this one is a bit different from the first one. the way i see it, there are two major motivations for making a smurf for only one faction.
the first is that you are NOT playing on a simmilar elo when trying out a new deck. if you were to go into ranked with a new deck after a few sparrings, there would be many embarassing defeats. there might even be trash talk about how you are not as good as everyone thought you were. it even happens in sparrings. nobody likes being defeated by players you can typically win against and then hear them bragg about it later on. If you start with a smurf, nobody knows who you are and you can even ask "stupid" questions to experienced players and get advice without getting wierd responses because they regard you as the better player in general. Also you don't lose elo on your main account and drop in rank.
the second kind of players making a smurf for a specific deck do it because they want to know exactly how good they are with a specific fation. typically, they also don't hide their identity and typically chose names indicating the faction they are playing, such as "radi on fire" for instance.
#3: silly challange smurfs: i personally didn't see many of those around, but they exist. play tons of towers in pvp? play only starter decks? only tomes? sure thing you can do that and it typically results in some funny low elo plays/situations which you just don't have in high elo.
#4: stomping new players: this is typically true for players in lower elos who don't want to get frustrated by losing all the time. so they just go ahead and ruin the day of new players to make themselves feel better about themselves.
#5: comming back to the game after a break: this is a bit more of a high elo thing and also ties in with points made earlyer. you just don't want to see yourself failing and get laughed at. many players remember when they defeat "one of the big guys" and you just sort of lose your reputation. bfcards.info sure is full of stomp replays of you after you played poorly. just look at what happened with Flameworkz when he was rusty for the first 1-2 weeks after he came back.
looking at it this way, elo/rank reset might be nice for some of those players, but it's also abusable and does not help in those cases where you just want to play anonymously without having to think/worry about your performance/reputation. i don't have time to write a lot now, but i will make another post later on. i think the general idea about elo/rank reset is not too bad, but needs some tweaking.