I... like you.
People see Chinjao have Conq but can't somehow rationalize Admirals having it, even though an admiral has already been verbatim confirmed to have it (Sengoku).
I've said it before and I'll say it again, the "new" buzz powerup slowly but surely becomes more normalized, happened with advanced armament, conquerors, and it will with advanced conquerors and awakening as well.
Exactly, we're just reaching the true endgame. The top tier fighters in the Straw Hats will master the Haki they specialize in, while the weaker members will pick up some basic Haki (I think they might train with Shank's crew: IMO, I just want to see Yasopp train Usopp).
At EoS, there will be power gaps: I feel Kaido was much more intentional and intelligent about how he used his fruit compared to Big Mom, while Big Mom's Haki is more unstoppable at times: it's ridiculous that she wasn't down by the time she hit the ground. But, hell, can you imagine Kaido healing himself with the Soul Soul Fruit? That's even worse than his dragon durability, to me. Kaido would have sucked out the souls of every person in Wano useless to him to power himself... yikes.
How people take advantage of their own powers, and take advantage of other character's weaknesses is going to become the most important aspect of combat. People act like Luffy just punched Kaido to win, but, in reality, he was utilizing SO many skills at once: the increased blood-flow of Gear 2, the size-increase of Gear 3, the muscle tension of Gear 4 (you can see his fist twisting around), Ryou Haki he learned from Hyogoro/Rayleigh, Conqueror's Haki he learned from fighting Kaido, then Gear 5th coating the fist in lightning. AND PEOPLE ACTED LIKE IT WAS JUST A NORMAL PUNCH AAAAAGHHHHHH