Douriki was nothing more than a Dragonball homage, one of many in the series. Hell, one of the characters who explained the system was inspired by Taopaipai / Mercenary Tao, who was Oda's favorite DB villain.
This wasn't an awkward mistake or a concept Oda discarded after Enies Lobby. He undermined the Douriki / powerlevel system the moment it was explained. Physical strength plays only one part in a world with hundreds of ways to power up through Devil fruits, Willpower or other unique combat techniques (Fishman Karate, Hashoken, whatever Sanji is doing with DJ, various types of hypnosis, etc.).
And that's the best thing he could have done as an author. It might be frustrating for fans to speculate about the powerlevel of a character, but that's ultimately what keeps the young audience engaged. A powercounter telling you that Smoothie is 10% more powerful than Cracker would be boring.
I remember how terrible the conversations were when Douriki was first introduced. Thankfully it died out. But the 'bounties equal power' is here to stay. My argument to those people is always Chopper. He had a 50 berri bounty, but for a time he was probably the strongest of them all with Monster Point. This world is filled to the brim with all sorts of super crazy stuff. Devil Fruits make a power system irrelevant, and I am happy for that.