The best advice I can give you is to try and watch until they fight Arlong. You'll get your emotional backstories, your crazy adventures, and tear-jerking deaths in due time. One Piece is really basing itself more on the OG Dragonball than Z, to be honest.
The closest the show has come to a "super saiyan" moment is probably the Enies Lobby Arc with Zoro vs Kaku, Sanji vs Jyabura, Luffy's Gear Second powerup, Luffy vs Lucci, the Buster Call, everything blowing up, etc. The Marineford arc is pretty apocalyptic as well, but I can't say too much about that story without spoilers.
One thing that keeps me more invested in One Piece is that they don't waste all of their characters the way DBZ did.
Remember how Gohan went toe to toe with Frieza, gave the Cell Jr's that work and defeated Perfect Cell? Bushes.
Remember how Krillin one-shotted half of the Saibamen by himself, nearly killed Nappa, and cut Frieza's tail off? Bushes.
Remember how Piccolo trained Gohan and put in work against Frieza? Remember Piccolo's super gully fight against Android 17? Bushes.
Remember how Tien beat Goku in the World Tournament and held Cell back by himself? Bushes.
And Yamcha? They never treated his character right.
In One Piece, you'll get backstories for every member of the crew, and you get to see everybody shining and staying relevant to the plot. Characters from the earliest arcs will still be important and relevant years later. Major story arcs are foreshadowed hundreds of chapters in advance. Oda's level of planning is just on another level (

) once you start really getting into One Piece.