Now this makes me think. Kishimoto has been known to play around carefully with words throughout the series. Example being that technically, while Obito was a fake he has only spoken carefully worded truths since the very beginning. This makes me think that Orochimaru has always had some sort of limiter or handicap that has never allowed us to see his full strength. Kishimoto COULD bend stuff around and say Orochimaru was only admitting that Itachi was stronger than his CURRENT self. You could say this because people seemed to fear Orochimaru a lot more than they did Itachi.
Regardless, even so the databook stated Itachi is slightly stronger than Orochimaru but that might not remain for much longer. I think Orochimaru is due to a long awaited power up. My guess is that Orochimaru and Sasuke are about to go to Obito's now unguarded hideout. This will give Orochimaru access to all sorts of nasties. First in the list will be his new Jutsu which could be what will grant Sasuke the chance to talk to the Hokages, all who can answer the questions Sasuke asked himself. By this I mean breaking Reaper Death Seal. This will grant Orochimaru access to his soul arms again and then Impure World Resurrection. After that Orochimaru could take control of the four Hokages. To add further to this, Kishimoto mentioned the POSSIBILITY of Jiraiya and Shisui coming back since Obito's hideout holds their blood samples.
Add to this that Obito's numerous Sharingan are also unguarded so Orochimaru could empower his summons with surgically implanted Sharingan just like Kabuto did with Hashirama's DNA on Madara. To take this even further, what if Orochimaru melds Yamato and the White Hashirama clone to form a perfect clone of the first Hokage that he could use for his next body? So in summary if Orochimaru got his soul into a perfect Hashirama body, and Minato, Hiruzen, Tobirama, Hashirama, Shisui, and Jiraiya as summons with Sharingan powers ups would he not become god tier?
