Oh, I believe it will dramatically, especially if people want to stay in the Top 10 each week. Regardless of the leagues, the more we can reach out, the better. :)
I concur with everything else you've said. It is one of the best projects, it is great for the platform, and we just need to get more and more people involved.
We should organize a go for the green week to promote the league. I know I need to spread the word more than I do. Never know when one of us will stumble upon another top five contender. I am sure they are out there just not getting counted yet.
I think Asher signed up quite a few after the total CL list he came up with, I think it was only last week still. He published two last week, so that's confusing me at the moment. :)
What he probably needs to do is run a list of the top 50 who have commented with unique users over a week's period of time. That would probably draw more of those folks out. Not sure if that query is possible, since he was having us do that individually last week, too. :)