No, you didn't see it because they were straight up punishable. This is one of the literal basics of MK9 at a high level, not sure what you're on about. Noone ever did poke into poke in that game.Mix and mids were lightning fast? Mids are the exact same speed as they've always been.
Did you actually play MK9?
I was talking about X and a blocked poke was counterable.
But my main point you are ignoring is that it's not cheap or broke. It's the meta. Adapt or lose. What good players do when they encounter something that gives them trouble is lab up responses. There are many universal counters to D1 mash. But what I'm seeing here is players saying, I don't like this feature, change it instead of untilizing practice mode(the best one to date).
Instead players like you are saying, throws are too strong, remove them, pokes are too strong remove them, jump in kicks are too strong remove them. This is a losing mentality and needs to go. Adapt and lab up responses to your problems. The patch button isn't your personal tool to make the game fit your playstyle.
There are multiple universal counters to Poke mash and I garantee D1 mash never beats players like Sonic, know why? Because he labs up the responses and adapts to the meta.
I'd be fine with a 6f D1 being -5 but not -7(GTFO if here). I understand Kotal mains being frustrated because all of his fast starters don't work and his D1 wiffs and his Command Grab wiffs. This isn't a problem with the game itself is specific to the character. But even with a character that is fundamentally failing in the poke and close up department he still has many options to counter poke mash.
Throw
Block and walk back wiff punish
But yes characters like Kotal need fixes so they can handle it better since his D4 is too slow to counter mashed D1 from Geras and his D1 wiffs and his D3 is absolute garbage.