Except that level scaling absolutely makes sense for a Pokemon game, or we would have the very common open world problem of the game’s difficulty curve completely falling apart once you get past the initial challenge
Now I can’t comment too much on the status of level scaling in games because apparently the main reason why people complain about this mechanic so much is due to its implementation in Elder Scrolls games which I haven’t played. Something about early game enemies becoming too spongey when their level scales with yours. Then they will say that something like Souls games do it right since when they offer you non-linear progression, every boss is challenging in their own way so they don’t need scaling in order to maintain their difficulty.
An open world Pokemon game isn’t comparable to any other successful non-linear game that doesn’t have scaling because Pokemon is not an action game at all, it’s a pure turn based RPG where stats matter a lot. Once you manage to beat a gym underleveled thanks to your use of competitive strategies or whatever, that’s it, you broke the game. No other gym will have this kind of challenge, the lower level ones especially will be total cakewalks.
The whole appeal of an open world Pokemon game is to go wherever you want instead of following an intended path like it was for multiple gens now. You start the game, you catch normal/flying/bug types in early routes, your starter carries you, you don’t have decent typing coverage until mid game, you get your full team, you beat the champion. Now what if the open structure let you go to the late game routes right away to get a Dratini instead of a Pidgey, then you beat the Dragon gym which has level 10 Dragon types for once but later the basic early game Flying gym has a bunch of fully evolved Flying types and isn’t a cakewalk. You get to go where you want and grab the Pokemon you want without the difficulty curve completely falling apart as a result of that. To me this sounds way more interesting than sweeping through every gym after you managed to beat an overleveled one