-> He was introduced as a character that people in Wano despised, a flat out delinquent, only a handful of people liked him
-> He was then hated again by people of Wano for the dancing shit
-> Whitebeard himself wasn't fking with him like that enough to take him on board from the get go, mans had to earn it
He died a hero because he sacrificed his life to protect Wano in his own way, thus people respected/liked him, on a tiny ass island and couple handful of people outside of that tiny ass island.
Name a person who didn't like Newgate? Even the people who went after his life had wet fantasies about Newgate, like Crocodile. Mihawk was creaming himself at the thought of just being able to fight Newgate. You had bum pirates like Buggy glazing up and down Newgate's pole before his actual introduction. Even Garp and Sengoku fked with Newgate, but stood against him due to him being a pirate. Ivankov in ID is glazing up Newgate. Jinbei couldn't get off his knees for Newgate... Akainu literally got turned into a moronic dumbfuck of an idiot, just so Newgate could have a "Badass ending" instead of getting beheaded by a magma fist.
Do we need to talk about Shanks?
I just think y'all are doing projection or rather adding on things that didn't exist. He was like as much as Harald is liked by pirates. Garp likes Harald, Sengoku likes Harald, Xebec likes Harald, Whitebeard likes Harald, his own people like Harald. His people liked Harald even when he was a fucked up asshole. Then other nations love Harald. Why is this criticism not applicable to Harald?
Oden is not the guy when it comes to "he was the coolest guy". Mans is one of the biggest failures in the series on a consistent basis and Oda made sure to write him that way in nearly every step of the way, until the very end with him fulfilling his role with the prophecy shit, which was arguably the only thing he actually succeeded in.
With all that said, if somebody finds him annoying, that's their right to. I'm simply talking about the writing being great for him, as somebody asked me why I think he's a great character.