The original Doctor Strange was an unremarkable film carried by its visuals. It was fairly novel for its time, but ultimately forgettable, and even a lot of people seem to agree that the character didn't hit a true stride until Infinity War. Movies don't exist in a vacuum, a movie like that might've impressed then while the hype was riding high, but if that was the extent of what Derrickson had to say with the property, it's very unlikely that level of "quality" would've passed now considering how people argue for MCU fatigue becoming readily apparent. Much like Ant-Man and The Wasp, I enjoyed it while it was happening and I remember maybe five things about it.
By contrast, even if I hadn't enjoyed MoM immensely, it's damn near the most interesting film Marvel has put out in a good decade purely in terms of what it opts to do and what it's allowed to do. In a series that's turned its formula into money and discouraged perceptions of deviations, this is a film that's actually pretty interesting on several levels; and not just for the ways in which the whole multiverse is treated as a means to an end rather than some kind of fanservice bonanza. I'll probably actually still remember this film a few months from now.
All of that which is to say, I don't see how you can argue Raimi was not an upgrade over Derrickson unless all you care about is some arbitrary RT number.
