No, I don't like this, sorry. By reducing the athletics and increasing the swing speed, you'd only give people with crush through an easy time to just flatten you regardless of whether or not you actually block, and that is only one problem.
There are currently two people who I literally cannot block due to the fact that physically, I cannot see the swing because they are to blindingly fast. Both weapons have been a constant bane with many threads asking for them to have their speed reduced and this would only make this easier to do.
I think the reason that Native is like that is because the classes are fixed, here they are not, that brings a massive difference between the way things work, which also brings about a balance that is constantly changing.
I hope this gets my points across without too much rambling, but this is how I feel about that, it'd give far too much bonus to slower people, and I wouldn't be able to out run one handers who I don't have a hope in hell of killing with my 10 wpf in 2 handed.
EDIT: And there is one of the people I am talking about already posted! xD haha Biased, of course you are!