To be fair with Western media, they are comparing him to European leaders like Merkel, Sholtz, David Cameron, Boris Johnson, François Hollande, etc.
So if you have such “leaders” as the benchmark, Erdogan can look like a mastermind…
Not only that, it's all because Türkiye has a better military, access to fresh water sources, control over bosphorus and is a bridge between east-west... all these attributes make Türkiye a geopolitical powerhouse. With that said the government has completely mismanaged these advantages in its attempt to cling into power.