This. All of this.

I play in plat usually on my main, my alt got low af(...tequila may have been involved) so I just started experimenting in comp since I literally didn't care about the sr on that account. I'm a tank/support on my main but for science I only play dps on my alt. Primarily widow. I'm nowhere near a great widow but I look like one in silver. When widow isn't working I just switch to whatever dps hard counters the enemy team's biggest threat, which usually ends up with me being pharah or junk cause bastion. I've improved my dps enough that I can literally carry myself from mid silver to mid gold in a few hours on my alt. I've kinda had to do it a couple times cause tequila.

I didn't believe it until I saw it for myself but the system really does try to adjust you up when you perform well. My alt will start having normal gains/losses if I play a few sessions badly or if I get high enough. But if I'm sober and actually trying I start getting 40-50sr gains and like 10-15sr losses. Then it starts evening out when I get higher in gold cause I'm probably gold level on the characters I play on that account, maybe just maybe low plat if I applied myself but I don't care enough to try that hard on my alt.

So basically if you play well enough you can legit have less than a 50% win rate and still rank up. It started happening on my main recently, too, but not as drastic, because I only fell down a little compared to where I'm usually at.

Honestly giving less fucks helps a ton, too. I win way more when I just chill out and play my best heroes and have fun.