Board Thread:Versus Debates/@comment-26005711-20151017081553/@comment-734582-20151019105752

Curse of Hatred wrote: To be fair though, Orochimaru wasn't trying to kill Itachi, but still... he went down incredibly easy for someone that can tank 4 tailed Naruto. Maybe he just underestimated Itachi. I think the latter is the case. Itachi joined Akatsuki pretty young while Orochimaru was already a multi-war veteran. I think he simply didn't expect Itachi to be that strong, and so was caught offguard.

Itachi is probably stronger than Jiraiya, i think Itachi was simply trying to avoid an unnecessary fight. Obviously their strengths are very different (powerful Ninjutsu vs powerful Genjutsu)