No shit, people are grinding it for the items, just like last year. It's like playing LoL for the IP. I'm almost surprised how many people are fixated on that, but then again we have TF2 as a proof of concept. It's not as bad this year, because I have 2 new heroes to fuck around with and I play completely different heroes, but boy is it painful to watch people struggle with "your" heroes.
I think even Valve was surprised by willingness of people to grind game mode for items, I think I doubled my inventory during the event. You can see how toned down Frostivus was and crafting introduced this year.