In the fan-made game Pokemon Legends of the Arena, instead of 8 gyms and a champion, you fight in a series of tournaments to win the championship. Each tournament is in a different town, allowing the pokemon journey feel to remain in effect. Now, the game isn’t exactly good, but how would you feel about GameFreak using a similar concept in the official games?

So the tournaments sort of take the place of Pokémon Gyms in terms of the games’ structure?  Could be interesting, and personally I like the idea of tinkering with the formula.  I think this kind of format would be quite neat if it allowed you to explore what the Pokémon League is, how it works, and who its leaders are a bit more.  There’s a lot of worldbuilding stuff in that area where Game Freak has always just kinda let us fill in the blanks.