Whether the change to the metagame (re: playing 1850) makes sense or not, the fact is a large enough group of people want to play at 1850 that it's worth having an 1850 list available. Whether you do it as tournament prep for yourself or because you want to get a game against Nick is somewhat immaterial.
And then, there's that 1850 tournament that got posted (admittedly after most of the 1850 lists here did) which suddenly justifies everything.