Character Discussion The previous generation had too many contenders for WSS for any of them to be definitively be crowned

[Desolate Smaug]

Everyone and their grandmom was high level top tier swordsman.

Just to name a few.
Rocks
Roger
Shiki
Ray
Harald.

I think this created a situation where for you to really gain the title you would need to actually defeat a bunch of these guys.

In the present Age there is only Mihawk and Shanks. Shanks without an arm seems washed as a swordsman. Fuji is a decent one too his shtick is mainly raining down extra planetary objects on people. I think it was extremely easy for Mihawk to gain this title since there was a vacuum of power. And it's not just Mihawk, even for WB.

To put it into perspective, after God valley and then later after Roger died, WB was basically the only Old Gen guy left behind. Kaido was still growing, and Big Mo,m while formidable, will always be placed slightly below her male contemporaries. Shiki and Ray then faded away from pirate life and that just left only Shanks and Mihawk (Oden was twerking in Wano) as the only youngish, strong swordsmen. It was only a matter of time till on of them got crowned as the best.

 

[Orojackson Refugee]

Weekly WSS denial thread

 

[ConquistadoR]

In the present Age there is only Mihawk and Shanks. Shanks without an arm seems washed as a swordsman. Fuji is a decent one too his shtick is mainly raining down extra planetary objects on people. I think it was extremely easy for Mihawk to gain this title since there was a vacuum of power.

Maybe but Shanks is no joke tbh.
He's literally a copy of Roger & Xebec.
Kaido rates him on par with those two and there's no difference between those legends and Shanks, except an arm.

Not to forget, Mihawk was fighting him when he had two arms... essentially not "washed" as you say.

Moreover, we have characters like Shamrock, Garling, Venus, Fujitora, Shiryu who all fall under the title.