The sannin are actually pretty weak compared to their title.
Are we reading and watching the same Naruto here? Please tell me you're in the "Naruto discussion" section rather than the One Piece section. The Sannin are worthy of their titles. Everybody knows me to copy and paste my arguments of mine, so allow me to copy and paste my rebuttal to that statement:
"Dude, they brought victory to Konoha in the second shinobi world war, they were the pillar of he Konoha army. Together as a team they managed to win many battles, and they gave Konoha it's formidable reputation as having the 3 Sannin. These Sannin went through challenges that most shinobi have never been through, their names are known far and wide as a symbol of their strength. They were Kage level shinobi, all 3 were offered the title of being hokage, heck even Minato wasn't the 1st hokage candidate, it was actually Orochimaru. The only reason why Hiruzen gave the title of Hokage to Minato was because of Orochimaru's twisted ambitions. Otherwise Orochimaru was a hokage candidate that was more likely to become hokage than Minato. now, if Orochimaru was kage level before mastering his forbidden jutsus and arsenal of ninjutsu, imagine now how strong he is when he was at his prime (prime here refers to when he fought Hiruzen, when he was healthy, contained all his forbidden jutsus and his arsenal was complete). You seem to underestimate the sannin, the sannin don't possess a gekkai genkai, nor are they jinchuurikis yet look at what they've accomplished and attained?
They received the HIGHEST DATABOOK STATS, with only Itachi higher than Orochimaru and Tsunade, but tied with Jiraiya. Are you telling me that it was luck for the Sannin to pull of an almost perfect databook entry, with only Itachi higher than 2 of the sannin but tied with the 3rd sannin?
Orochimaru databook entry: 35
Tsunade: 35
Jiraiya: 35.5
Those happen to be the highest databook entries, and rant all you want about the databook being meaningless, if someone gets the highest databook stats it may not prove 100% that they're on top of everyone, but it signifies their high rank as being a ninja. This type of rank is extraordinarily powerful. Databook stats wouldn't matter if a ninja gets a low entry but later on improves drastically, like Naruto for example.
They were the students of Hiruzen Sarutobi, dubbed as one of the strongest shinobi in history, and his sensei was Nidaime hokage, so the sannin trace their source of strength all the way to the 1st legendary hokage. It's not the sannin's fault that Kishi never once gave them an adequate fight:
Orochimaru: His fight against Hiruzen is very misunderstood. He was only trying to torment him, he wasn't aiming to kill him. dude, do you have any idea how many times during the fight orohimaru acted like a fool trying to tease hiruzen, yet he had an opportunity to finish hiruzen off. HE WASN'T AN ATOM'S WEIGHT SERIOUS THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE FIGHT, ONLY AFTER HE WAS LOCKED IN HIRUZEN'S SEALING TECHNIQUE THEN HE BECAME SERIOUS. He was only toying with the Third, people need to stop rationalizing the fight in order to make him look weak. We can't judge him from that fight especially from how much he was actiing like a circus clown in order to mock and tease Hiruzen. His fight against Sasuke, he was half dead already, yet he still managed to be beat sasuke because the second he paralyzed sasuke the fight ended, so everything that happened afterwards wasn't part of the fight. Against Itachi, okay he got sealed, but so did Nagato, so now what's your point??? He put up an AMAZING, SUPERB JOB against 4 tailed Naruto, he fought a raampaging BIJUU while his body was in a dying state, without flinching, hesitating nor losing his composure. Tell me, is that unimpressive?
Jiraiya was only given one fight against Pain and he did a tremendous job. His fight against Orochimaru he was drunk.
Tsunade was only given one fight also and throughout the fight she was traumatized by her fear of blood.
Their boss summons alone can solo a majority of ninjas. They possess some of the strongest boss summons in Naruto, with only a few ninjas with better boss summons. Jiraiya can summon 3 massive S Rank toads, with 2 kage level elder toads, Orochimaru can summon manda, the most colossal snake in the entire world, and he can summon triple headed snake and other giant snakes. Tsunade can summon a giant slug that can split apart, regenerate, and heal anyone. Overall the Sannin are elite kage level ninjas, you may not be impressed with them but most people are very respectful to the Sannin for their strength and accomplishments, especially their contribution to team 7's training. Had it not been for the sannin, team 7 would be weaker than even team Asuma by now."