@Sentinel @ConquistadoR
King actually having a better durability or something special then Kaido is not far odd, every firstmate has something better then his captain.
Katakuri had a insane CoO(future sight) and the perfect shield for Big mom.
Marco has a insane rege and mystic zoan, the perfect shield for Whitebeard.
King has a insane durability(his ability is not yet revealed), the perfect shield for Kaido.
Same goes for Ben and Shiryuu who going to have special abilites which put one of their attribute above their captains.
So it is not far odd to think via his special skill that King has a better durability then Kaido, in fact tatsumaki didn´t really scratch him.
@DarkWitch
Yeah no Firstmate stomp the another firstmate, they are all around same ballpark, some less, some more.
All of them have unique power and portrayal by Oda, in case Katakuri is above dodging and not let himself hit by hiis opponents, Marco has his insane regeneration power and King has insane durability.
Im pretty sure Oda will give King also CoC and awakened(going to put more info later in my post)power, same probably goes for Marco who reveal it later against someone.
So far I would say the list looking like this:
King=>Katakuri=>Marco
I place King right now as strongest YC(Ben and Shiryuu are featless), right next Katakuri and Marco. If Marco get later more feats and when we see King in full serious mode, the list could change.
Sentinel make a great point and
@Echizen_Jo_Ndule is not wrong, Katakuri biggest problem was plotarmor for Luffy, Katakuri alone probably would be enough to beat everyone on sunny+capone crew. Including Jinbe and Sanji, the problem was Luffy was his opponent and we see right now how even Kaido struggle against Luffy. This guy jump from getting low diffed by Kata to beat him extrem high diff with powerups and plotarmor. Also Kaido one shoting Boundman didn´t make it better....
Overall Katakuri Mogura feats and his awakening controll is one point.
King is a speedstar and physical monster with a insane durability. My bet is on King for the strongest commander, I can only see perhaps Ben above him.
I think Oda did it on purpose, since he want his hybrid kinda different to his base form.
You can see Oda loving to draw Base King, I assume he choose this way since for awakening later he can show a mix hybrid version of both base and zoan to make King even looking moore beastly, like this:
A version where he have both wings and both hands to use them to protect himself and speed up.
I think we going to see King true form when he going to use awakening.
BS, im not even sure if Boundman would have the upperhand, since King seems physical stronger and he is also faster.
At this point im not sure even if two rounds of Boundman would be enough.