Them needing to beat them isn't an excuse for this being good story telling but whatever.
It is quite clear now that everyone bar Luffy got powercreeped to where they should be at right now because Oda realized he fucked up by making Post Skip the Luffy show and having him be the only one that had a natural power progression.
Yes, im including Zoro in this.
He was powercrept. And that's understandable but let's not act like this is good story telling in itself, Post skip was a mess.