It's pretty obvious that the strawhats aren't going to defeat yet another shichibukai in such a short timeframe. As with most other series, you can sort of detect a pattern in the arcs after a while, and the trend I see with Oda is that a big battle is always concluded with some sort of chase sequence. Kuma has nothing the pirates want, so it's in there best interest to flee right now. I too interpreted Hogback's recovery and declaration as a hint that he might try to save the day, so we'll see what happens from there.
In any case, the strawhats will be running from this fight.
