He backed down from shanks, not an admiral. he also stated he needed more time to master his new DF. He is also incredibly storng if he can hold WB's territories without being steamrolled by the other yonko. He might not be stronger at this point but we really dont know. For all we know he already has a third DF. He isnt a weak link at all, in fact his power provide a very useful way to fight the admirals because 2 of them are logia. One of which was shown to be able to maintain his logia intangibility even when faced with haki.He's right BB is the weak link in this. BB ran away from an admiral even with his crew by his side and I doubt he went through any rigorous training over the TS since he was claiming WB's & new territories with his crew and went DF hunting.
Edit: my bad you meant akainu post war arc. but still he realized he needed more time to prepare his df mastery.
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