@Knuckles:
Everyone seems to think the admirals are the strongest in the marines…tut tut
I'm positive people like garp are strong enough to be admirals, but aren't serious enough to be given the position, from garps pirate chasing history i would put him above the three admirals in strength, as well as a few other marines that seem to have some special authority, eg john giant, tsuru ........and so on
plus the way garp shouted "keep your mouth shut, amateur" to aokiji sort of makes me think he's fearless of the admirals, but weaker than sengoku, wb also mentions sengoku and garp which implies there's alot of respect to be earnt relating to strength and such
oh and one more thing........perhaps garp and another two vice admirals were the 3 admirals years ago but have taken lesser position in there old age
garp even mentions how his strength has gone done a fair bit, yet still throws an enormous iron ball effortlessly...........any thoughts, are the current admirals just the next generation or something?
The three admirals are most likely leagues stronger than Garp. That giant iron ball is no big deal at all compared to what the top tiers in One Piece could probably do. Heck that ball probably wasn't even beyond the level of what the Straw Hats could of knocked away. They have dealt with similar sized things (or slightly smaller) before and that was ages ago. They are much stronger now.
Ace was able to produce a massive fireball almost the size of an entire island (far bigger than what Garp threw) with one attack. Compared to that the iron ball is nothing.
That giant rock that was dropped on Luffy during Little Garden is most likely bigger too. And those giants would be far below Admiral levels.
I'd be willing to bet that thats not even the full extent of what Garp can do physical strength wise, but to say that that feat alone puts him at Admiral level or beyond is laughable.
Whitebeard only mentions Garp in the context of someone who knew the old world before modern times as well, which is more a comment about Garps age and experience than his strength. Garps comment to Ao Kiji could be about experience too. When did that happen anyway?