Well, it is a huge server, a healthy, huge AND old server, where most people are already geared or have a guild to gear their new characters, there are still VoA, ToC and ICC rep runs, but as you may know, not anyone is willing to lead a pug run... and that makes it kind of hard for the newcomers and soloplayers at warmane, other than that, most people know how to roll out and get an easier time gearing up.
Edit: of course, I'm just talking about legit players. Other than that, you already know the reason...
Go to OG/SW and inspect 10 wars/dks 5 of them will have SM. Or join arena at any MMR you will face only 6k gs ppl ,some of which are incredibly bad.
To fix your problem, there are some ICC10 rep farms in mornings or get 5k gs doing some HC + some extra piece from AH and join normal ICC 10. (there are quite a few of those)
People still do occasionally rep farms. No idea why would you want to pug an ICC10 where people ask for absurdly high GS and then wipe on gunship. Find yourself a community, a small guild and start from there. Pugs are disgustingly bad.
Playing on 0 rating with some green ppl to get cap all I see are near or bis players on 0 rating,. No 4k, 5k ppl... sad. It was the fun back in the day...