Well, Johto did suck. But Kanto was quite lacking, to be fair. If half the things that happened back in Kanto happened now, people would complain. Lame running gags every episode (i.e. Jigglypuff), catch'n'Oaks with no development, releases, lack of evolutions, starters glorified, etc.
Imagine Ash got a Torchic, Treecko and Mudkip, and a Taillow. No Torkoal or Corphish, unless maybe they're caught as Oak-fillers. And a Wurmple, which evolves within two episodes and buggers off within another fifteen. The starters never evolve, except Torchic, who becomes a Combusken for two episodes before evolving again into a disobedient, lazy Blaziken that gets badly overrated by fans. Treecko is too up itself to become a sexy Grovyle and Mudkip is useless. Ash comes in the top 16 of the Hoenn League, of which about three battles were shown, and loses to his clone because of Blaziken. Taillow evolves and leaves. Oh, and Misty's there.
It would suck!
Oh, and benmeister 2, you're forgetting [SPOIL]Phanpy/Donphan[/SPOIL].