What I was trying to say was that Oda made it so it wasn't a battle of strength. He defeated Yonji. The question of "is he as strong as them" was immediately settled from the start of the arc.
What Judge hated was his attitude. Notice judge didn't call him weak. Why did he "lose" to Judge? He refused to kick that clone. If Sanji had done that, Judge would happily have accepted.
End of the day, he changed them and they became self sacrificing like Sanji. Germa we met would never have covered for the crew or given him a raid suit.