User blog comment:Joekido/Archetypes in One Piece/@comment-1940096-20140104173955/@comment-2226235-20140105180843

It still had well over 100 episodes then, which makes it longer than most anime. I think the length is the main reason people don't start it now since 4kids lost the license years ago. They probably were what stopped most people from getting into it at first, though. Ironically, without 4kids I never would have started watching One Piece since I watched the 4kids dub back when I was too young to realize how terrible it was.