@Yuugi's:
They'll notice, but will they really care? Series have recap episodes all the time. Add in some creative editing and directing and the transitions could be quite smooth.
One Piece the comic moves at a slow-as-molasses pace. Oda stretches his story with pointless characters, scenes, and gags that are otherwise counterproductive to making a timely, satisfying work. Three or four chapters worth of material in a single episode is much more preferred, especially with creative writing that ignores parts of the original that don't work. This can be applied to any franchise being adapted into animation.
A month's worth of episodes or even a cour's worth of episodes, both would be a blip on the radar. One Piece the animated series isn't going to be canceled. Animated series survive with far fewer ratings than what One Piece makes. One Piece has the advantage of being a cog in a multi-media franchise, the cartoon isn't going to be canceled so easily.
It hardly worked for Dragon Ball, a series that had a higher production value than One Piece and it certainly doesn't work for a series that is seven hundred episodes long and isn't going to end for another decade because its author has horrible taste and the staff at Shueisha are too worried about losing a big series to tell him to speed things the fuck up.
"Series have recap episodes all the time" -> You don't really know what you're talking here!
Series with 12 episodes -> 0 recap episodes.
Series with 24 episodes -> Normally 1 episode.
Long Running series -> Highly vary but One Piece probably has the most amount of recap episode and it has 7. In a 710 episode.
"One Piece the comic moves at a slow-as-molasses pace" -> No it doesn't. You may think that, but other people don't. Fortunately Oda isn't doing One Piece just for you.
"A month's worth of episodes or even a cour's worth of episodes, both would be a blip on the radar" -> It would be a blip where a ton of people would jump ship and never return!
"Certainly doesn't work for a series that is seven hundred episodes long and isn't going to end for another decade" -> So you're saying that the 10%, Top 5 TV ratings, for the almost 9 years that this is going is "Certainly doesn't work"? Obviously works!
"Author has horrible taste" -> Nope!
"Shueisha are too worried about losing a big series to tell him to speed things the fuck up" -> Shueisha let's its authors keep doing anything they doing as long as is popular enough(Big example -> Kochikame). It has nothing to do with being worried about losing a big series. Their roster is amazing right now, and they can always make Oda make another series(if One Piece ended like now). Just like they did with Toriyama(Dragon Ball right after Dr. Slump).
Did you saw they having that many problem about ending Naruto and Kuroko no Basket? Nope, what would make you think they have problems in ending One Piece.