I'll be an odd man out here and post the devils advocate, I've played a lot of item mode this closed beta. Having won 1st place in a lot of rounds where most of my team lagged behind the entire game, if you get 1st place on blue for example, and you're being trailed by 3 reds, the game is actually a lot harder for the person in 1st place than it is for the gang of people behind him. It's a team game, if the 3 to 4 of you trailing exactly behind the guy in 1st place and cannot get enough attacks/ufos/etc, together to knock out the guy in first place, than I wouldn't really say you're working as a team but individuals trying to win, and didn't deserve to win.

It's a lot harder trying to maintain a lead when all of your guys are in the rear and you're the only one riding solo at the lead. That's 3 people whose Will O' Wisps immediately target you upon being rolled, unless you get a wide enough map lead to hide yourself around turns/corners you're open to other attacks too, from the entire strength of the opposing team.

If you're complaining about a guy taking the lead in the last second by something like a magnet and speed boost at the end, I wouldn't say the points in item mode would really fix this issue considering the final placements of an item game are usually extremely different than where it was 10 seconds prior in the first place due to last minute item rolls and you'd just be pushing the issue down onto who gets 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.

I feel like winner takes all in item mode makes sense, and a weighted point system in Speed makes sense for that game mode too. The biggest reasoning behind that is, winner takes all allows the back of the pack on your team to be able to focus on supporting the guy in the lead. A map I'll use as an example is wayward turnabout, with the way RNG is on items it's hard for me to go into that map and have my proficiency of the map be able to help me win. It's too close together, and there's opposing traffic coming at you too. So I'll focus more on supporting the guy in 1st and being a shield if I'm in 2nd or 3rd to block attacks that would be targeted towards them, or using attacks/other crowd control to maintain our lead if i'm in the back of the pack. It's a team based game mode, and I've noticed if you evaluate your teams positioning and use your items accordingly you can usually win the game either by leading the pack or in a support role.