It can't be his max potential. That's like saying Cell's max potential is his FP PC/SPC power levels because he declared himself perfect at the time. If Vegeta started out weaker than Zarbon and still wasn't maxed out by the Boo arc then Cell or Boo maxing out so early makes zero sense.
I think if AT were asked who was the strongest pre BoG he would've said Goku, but if Gohan is still Ultimate it should be him going by the OG manga's logic.
Shouldn't Oob have more potential than Gohan? Gohan's starting power even while enraged was only 1307 and future Gohan wasn't even Yardrat Goku level after training for over a decade. Oob surpasses that at age 10 by a mile. Even Ultimate Goku might be Super Boo level lol.
Way farther. Even to Freeza he said he should train and get better if he wanted to challenge him again. I think Goku expects a fully trained Oob to surpass SSJ3 EoZ Gotenks or Ultimate Gohan at least, since he thinks Oob will be his best challenger.
Only material written years and years after the end of the manga seems to treat it as a transformation that can be switched on and off, except Z Movie 13
Prior to Super Hero Gohan seemed to be in the altered base state at all times, other than when he lost the fitness level to retain the...
It was stated to permanently alter his personality and Ki signature by Piccolo. I don't think Gohan (prior to DBS anime/Super Hero continuities retconning it) can physically revert to his non-Ultimate base state, only power down to regularly functioning levels like how Goku walks around with a...
In the OG manga it just appeared to be a hyper powerful base form. Gohan didn't revert to his regular state when he was inactive for a whole hour, and his eyes were still fully inscribed and sharp when donating Ki to the genkidama.
SSJG - lost to Beerus
SSJB - needed Whis' help to win, got cucked by a laser beam
SSJBKK - Goku surrendered
UI Sign/MUI - wore off and Jiren had to be defeated through a team effort. Even needed Oob's help to fully put down Moro
UE - got cucked by Granolah and Gas alike
SSJBE - got cucked by...
I don't think AT particularly gives a shit about the part where he said two parties need to be very close in power to try the dance considering he established that Ultimate Gohan can fuse with Goku despite the massive power difference between them. Goku also didn't seem to expect Vegeta to have...
A similar case was when Itachi's voice actor read farther in the manga and saw that Itachi wasn't really evil and began portraying him too softly where the anime was at, when he was still portrayed as a villain