Tropes A to B (Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole, Arc Villain, Berserk Button, Beware the Silly Ones, Big Brother Instinct, Bowdlerise, Break the Cutie) | Tropes C to D (Call-Back, Chekhov's Gun, Cliffhanger, Combat Pragmatist, Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass, Curb-Stomp Battle, Dark and Troubled Past, Deconstructed Character Archetype) | Tropes E to F (Early Installment Weirdness, Famous Last Words, Foreshadowing) | Tropes G to J (Heart is an Awesome Power, Hypocrite) | Tropes K to M (Laser-Guided Karma, Logical Weakness, Mass "Oh, Crap!", Moral Myopia, Muscles Are Meaningless) | Tropes N to P (Nice Job Fixing It, Villain, Oh, Crap!, O.O.C. Is Serious Business) | Tropes Q to S (The Reveal, Shout-Out, Spanner in the Works, Superpower Lottery) | Tropes T to Z (Wham Episode, Wham Line)
One Piece invokes Muscles Are Meaningless frequently, the common Giant Mook or Boisterous Weakling will get the piss knocked out them by underestimating or bullying the main heroes, e.g Luffy vs Bellamy in Jaya or Luffy vs Hajrudin in Dressorsa.
- The CP9 have huge guys like Blueno, Kumadori, and Fukuro but they’re actually the weaker members. By far the most powerful guys in the team are the lean and average-sized Rob Lucci, Kaku, and Jabra. Though the aforementioned trio subverts this as they each have a Zoan Super Mode which makes them bigger. Played straight with Kalifa who is supermodel skinny, but can bring down muscular male opponents.
- Blueno spells this trope out when The Big Guy Tilestone hits him with a metal sledgehammer and Bluneo smashes the hammer like it's paper.
- Blueno: Are those muscles just for show?
- Blueno spells this trope out when The Big Guy Tilestone hits him with a metal sledgehammer and Bluneo smashes the hammer like it's paper.
- By the Wano arc, the main antagonists of the arc, Evil Overlord Kaido, his Co-Dragons King and Queen, and Big Mom are roughly the size of houses and naturally massively strong. All of the protagonists and allies who end up fighting them on Onigashima, on the other hand, are regular sized humans. Whilst Zoro and Kid are quite muscular, Luffy, Sanji and Law still look like tiny dolls compared to the near-giant antagonists.
- Luffy's small arms are justified since he is made of rubber and can inflate them whenever he wants like when fighting Crocodile (where his bicep became larger than his head
◊). Zoro, on the other hand, is just plain crazy. When he flexes, his arms become the size of his torso then when they're relaxed they are normal size. Sanji would seem play this trope as he can smash down buildings but looks like a bean pole, but it's a case of Clark Kent Outfit for him. - Franky is massive compared the three previously mentioned (especially after the time skip) and while he is a super strong Cyborg he's still quite significantly weaker than Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji who have crazier Super-Strength. The aforementioned Rob Lucci (who's a beanpole compared to Franky) was able to send to the cyborg flying across the room with a single kick. Though Franky does make it up for strength with technology (the Monster Trio can't shoot exploding laser beams) but Franky is still humble enough to say that the trio are "strongest" in the crew in Thriller Bark. Averted when Franky fought Nero though, being a lean Fragile Speedster wasn't doing Nero any favors against Franky.
- Chopper's "Heavy Point" increases his strength by quite a margin but (like Franky) he has comparatively less super strength than the average-sized Monster Trio, given the lean Sanji could effortlessly overpower Heavy Point Chopper with one arm in Water 7. Averted with Chopper "Arm Point" and "Monster Point" where the muscle/size boost drastically improves his strength to the point where he effectively defeats stronger opponents and can even stun a Big Bad like Shiki (in Movie 10). Played straight with Chibi-Chopper who carry huge iron balls with his stubby arms in Whole Cake Island arc.
- Usopp bulks up during the Time Skip and is more visibly muscular than Luffy and Sanji, but Usopp still doesn't have a quarter of their strength and can be easily beaten by Franky. Oda also states Usopp will always be the weakest crewmate which means even the lithe Nami could beat him up if she wanted to. Still, Usopp can lift far greater weights than any normal human could, as One Piece Stampede shows.
- Also, Robin is a tall, slight woman with the strength of an above-average athlete, which is pretty weak compared to some of the monsters of the series. However, she easily makes up for it with her Devil Fruit ability, which allows her to break your back effortlessly.
- Robin: Power. Speed. Against me, they mean nothing.
- During Onigashima, Robin unleashes her Demonio Fleur, which drastically increases her size, but she's still as slender as ever.
- Same as Robin, Nami has a surprising amount of strength despite having a supermodel physique. In the early series, she could carry a sack of gold (which can weigh tons) around, in Water 7 she can long jump over buildings with no trouble. Nami is capable of bringing down foes with a Megaton Punch or a flurry of kicks (as seen Enies Lobby anime). On Weatheria, Nami showed she was capable of running extremely quickly while carrying both a heavy bag much larger than herself and also the Wizard Haredas with great ease. In Zou Nami single-handedly brought down Mink Wanda with nothing but her staff, though Wanda was weakened.
- This applies to the admirals, Kizaru being the most prominent example; they are among the most powerful of antagonists, but all three are very thin for their height. In the case of Kizaru, however, there's a justification for this. He can move at the speed of light — with that sort of power you're always going to hit hard regardless of how much muscle you have, if only due to sheer speed.
- Out of the Whitebeard Pirates, Marco has the least muscle mass and is far smaller than his captain, but he's also Whitebeard's Number Two and has one of the strongest Zoan-type Devil Fruits the Mythical Zoan-model Phoenix.
- Before Alvida ate her Devil Fruit she had decent Stout Strength (being able to wield a large iron club), but she's still strong after eating even though it made her much skinnier (and more attractive).
- The introduction of Amazon Lily featured a refreshing subversion. A lithe, beautiful woman duels a gorilla-sized lady-gonk in hand-to-hand combat. The gorilla beats the snot out of her slender, delicate opponent.
- Carrot in her Sulong form is still petite as ever, but still has enough Super-Strength rip off a ship's rudder and even crack the ground with her Super-Speed. Earlier, she carries heavy iron balls (chained to her feet) alongside Chopper.
- Subverted with most of Charlotte Family and Big Mom Pirates as a lot of them are muscular powerhouses like Katakuri, Oven, and Cracker as well as Statuesque Stunners like Smoothie and Cinnamon; and that's not mentioning the insane Stout Strength of Big Mom herself. But there are a few examples of this:
- Perospero is 50 years old and looks like a stiff breeze would knock him over, and yet he physically overpowers Pedro a Jaguar Mink with little effort and then shrugs off a massive explosion.
- Amande, the Master Swordswoman of the Big Mom Pirates, has the typical supermodel physique, but add in her Long Neck and she looks very fragile. However, the first time we see her in a fight, she bisects a massive tree monster with ease. She's easily the strongest female sword-user seen in the post Time Skip.
- Tamago though he's not a child of Big Mom like previous examples is very strong despite being built like an egg with legs.
- Wano arc similarly has multiple characters who invoke this.
- Asura Doji is a fat and lazy samurai who can Speed Blitz Jack “The Drought” in seconds.
- From the same arc there’s Hyogoro a tiny old man who makes up for his size with enhanced Busoshoku Haki which helps him beat far larger foes. Inverted in Onigashima, as Hyogoro briefly regains the Heroic Build of his Glory Days and manages to be a Mook Horror Show.
- Ulti from Flying Six, same lithe figure as most female characters, but in her first fight scene she matches and beats the more muscly Luffy in a headbutt competition.
- Black Maria while massive is stronger than her slender frame would suggest. Although she relies on knuckle dusters and ironically gets brutally overpowered in strength by Robin of all people, who activates her demonic Super Mode after Maria pushes her Berserk Button.
- Yamato, the child of Kaido, has the standard female character willowy frame, but he's strong enough to match his father Kaido blow to blow, the only other character in the present besides Luffy to be able do so.
- Probably taken to most logically extreme with the Seraphim seen in Egg Head island arc. Clones of the Seven Warlords of the Sea they are just children and with the exception of Jinbe and Kuma built like any Token Mini-Moe in the series. Yet these tykes can put the fear of god even in Blackbeard and beat the crap out of the post-Wano Straw Hat crew. This somewhat justfied in thay they have Lunarin DNA, therefore are immensely strong.
