Placing brush piles and cheating should never even be mentioned in the same sentence. I've NEVER read a rule against placing brush, other than lakes that have restrictions about placing them. You might not like anglers placing brush but in no way is it cheating.
I don't know about 7 mph but it doesn't take much damage to lose some performance. John's Hot Props is where I took mine and need to take it again from a similiar incident.
I generally fish 5 inch Kalins grubs on 1/4 ounce ball heads with a 3/0 hook, nothing fancy about grub fishing. Colors are I use are bluegill, blue pearl, smoke purple and plain smoke.
They were huge when they had multi-day pro-style tournaments, drawing anglers from as far away as Wisconson and Texas. Then they changed formats to the same as everybody else. I don't know if it's that or just a lack of tournament anglers in this economy that's the problem.