No it’s not an April Fools video but I wish it was

Tobias: - becomes a Pokémon Trainer - gets a Darkrai and a Latios - refuses to elaborate further - leaves

"How bad were Ash's League Losses?" *Yes.*

I love the fact that you can only confront the Elite Four after beating the League. It's an intermediate step that would be great to be implemented in the games.

I still like to imagine that Tobias only had 4 level 3 Bodoofs left on his team and just rushed the region with Darkrai and Latios

9:48 Don't forget, Cameron didn't even have 8 badges when he first met Ash, he thought he needed 7 for the league. Literally the only reason why he even got in was because Ash and crew were nice enough to tell him and help him find a gym that he could get his 8th badge in time. Incompetence is an understatement when describing Cameron and the fact that he went on to the next round just to lose soured the mood even more.

Squirtle getting disqualified for being put to sleep still baffles me to this day. I guess hypnosis is the most powerful move by the anime's standards

“This might be the worst episode title in the history of episode titles!” Twenty five years prior… “Will Goku be able to overcome the might of Freeza before Namek explodes!?” FREEZA DEFEATED

In my opinion, Ash should've been able to fight Virgil in the Unova Final, mirroring his loss to Harrison when fighting against Virgil's new type ace-in-the-hole: Sylveon. Ash's last Pokemon would be Scraggy (or even Scrafty if they decided to go that direction), and it would be in good shape, but then Sylveon comes out and absolutely demolishes it with a Moonblast. Ash, of course, would be completely dumbfounded, but him coming 2nd place after being so... lackluster in BW would be an accomplishment in itself.

Fun fact about the team against Tobias: most the pokemon on it had battled against Legendary/Mythical pokemon before in series. Torkoal had fought Registeel, Swellow and Sceptile had fought Deoxys, and Pikachu had straight up beaten Regice. The remaining two either were a perfect type matchup and Sleep Talk (Heracross) or were outright stated to have a move that would have knocked out Darkrai if it landed (Gible with Drago Meteor). Granted, Ash definitely had other options that he really should have considered over at least Torkoal (like a certain Charizard who defeated an Articuno)

Ash vs. Harrison was so cool as a kid and seeing Blaziken actually pull off a narrow defeat against Charizard instantly made it one of my favorite pokemon. Rhis battle was also cool because Brock speculated that Harrison lost his next match due to not bringing Blaziken so as not to push it so hard after such an intense battle.

I despise Tobias’ whole existence, his whole reason of existing was literally just the writers being lazy about forcefully making ash lose so they just threw in an unbeatable character last minute, and especially being after the great match against Paul it was just plain annoying, oh and to add salt to the wound they proceed to rub it into our face by telling us only Ash was able to defeat Darkrai, literally telling us that “yeah Ash most likely would have won if not for this jack ass”

The problem with the Richi loss, is that they used Team Rocket to force Ash into a losing spot. In general the indigo League had horrible pacing because of team rocket shenanigans

I got annoyed with how in the Unova League, aside from Cameron using Hydreigon as his “secret weapon”, having Ferrothorn against a Fire type and him forgetting his sixth Pokémon, was how much endurance his Lucario had Even when taking so much hits from Snivy and Pikachu, he still was able to get up, not to mention him losing to a trainer that Ash never battled either

It's always bugged me that they chose Charizars to be the pokemon that doesn't listen to Ash. Of ALL of his pokemon the only one besides Pikachu that he literally saved the life of was Charmander. That pokemon should have more loyal to him than any other besides Pikachu. The ONLY argument for why Charizard wouldn't listen to him is because it had a previous trainer before it could count as a "traded" pokemon, but even then it's Badges that make them obey you so by the League he had 8 and Charizard should have listened anyways. His Charizard always felt like a huge cop out excuse to give Ash an L when he normally would have won.

One thing that makes ash losing to Cameron even worse is that right before the league, they introduced Virgil (the guy that only used eeveelutions) and it seemed like they were setting him up to be ash's league rival and the guy who would eventually beat him. And they had a perfect opportunity to have a logical reason for ash to lose the league, since Virgil used all eeveelutions they could have had him use a surprise Sylveon which would beat ash because not only is it a pokemon he's never seen before, but it's also a type he's never seen before. But rather than taking this opportunity to have provide a cool battle and tease the upcoming generation, they instead decided to have ash lose to the character that is literally just himself but worse

What made Ash vs. Cameron even more offensive was that they had a competent trainer introduced as the region's Harrison or Tyson who Ash could've lost to and at least kept some dignity, in Virgil. Add to it Ash actually regressed from his previous league placements. So the entire loss was just insult upon insult.

The thing that pisses me off even more about the Cameron battle is that it makes Ash's Unova team look even weaker than it already did, because the only Pokémon of his that manage to get wins in it are Pikachu twice and Pignite twice, with those two even having the type advantage in all of those wins

And then the writers tried to make you forget Ash's loss to Ritchie by having him win the Orange Islands against a Dragonite

Cameron was basically the living embodiment of special type of plot armor known as “Beginner’s Luck”. He’s Ash if he somehow got all the way to the quarterfinals in the Indigo League.

I’ve said it for years, and it’s my own personal head cannon, Ash vs Paul should’ve been the Sinnoh League final. Both of their arcs come full circle and the climatic Infernape vs Electavire showdown. Tobias = worst character introduced Although it happens more then you think where the “final” happens in the semi-final of various tournaments BUT STILL

Cameron bothers me in so many ways, expecting us to believe hydreigon would obey him for starters

Ash: I've literally went through four regions now, as long as it's just good, fair battles, I'm sure I can win this time! Tobias: *I'm gonna put some dirt in your eye*

Words can't describe the anxiety I felt clicking this knowing there was a good chance I would hear the cursed "Good evening everybody. Good evening."

The Ash vs Ritchie fight was a bad loss because even though Ash still had a long way to go as a trainer, he was at a genuine disadvantage because of Team Rocket keeping him from getting to the match until the last minute. The match should have been delayed until Ash’s team could have been healed, and whether he won or lost entirely on the merits of his Pokémon, their training (or lack of) and their connection (or lack of) to him. The Team Rocket shenanigans only existed to keep Team Rocket in the episode and to handicap Ash.

I know you can technically make this argument with any battle in the anime, but if Ash doesn’t meet Harrison: he doesn’t go to Hoenn -> doesn’t meet Gary’s Electivire -> doesn’t get home right as Delia and Oak go to Unova-> doesn’t meet Alexa -> and so on. You are exactly right that it was his most influential loss, and I’d go further to say it was his most influential battle period.

Ash's story should have been completed in the XY&Z season. It was LITERALLY the ultimate send off for him and it was against a top-tier trainer who literally fought against legendary pokemon and Elite 4 members... Seriously, he had the girl, got the kiss, and all. All you need was a time skip with a new character and have him as guest appearances sometimes as a grown-up/ 21-24 year old (Top ranked world-wide trainer at that point) alongside Serena (Who would be a renowned world-class rank performer) who is also 21-24 years old and traveling around together, living their best life. Heck, let them have a house in Kanto with strong obvious hints of them being a official couple.. Is that so hard to write? No.

When it comes to Tobias, in the opening theme for that series you would see an Entei as well as Darkrai so it implies that he also had an Entei in his team of six.

The kalos league loss hurt so badly that the writers made him win in alola to try to make it up for the kalos loss

Besides Cameron, which we DON'T talk about, all of Ash's losses were against more experienced and considerably older opponents, or opponents with ridiculously overpowered mons, and he still took all of them to a near defeat besides the guy using literal legends, and even then he still took two of the guy's mons while literally everyone else in the league couldn't come close to defeating even one. People sure love to use Ash as a punching bag to feel better about themselves, but virtually all of his losses- besides the one we DON'T talk about- were more impressive than most characters wins. I gotta comment on loss against Tyson since I think you were way too easy on it though. I think everyone knows Tyson is just Harrison 2.0, to the point where if you swapped them around it would barely make a difference since they're basically the same character, but Harrison actually fulfilled his purpose extremely well, of introducing Ash to Hoenn Pokemon and inspiring him to go there, which makes up for him being introduced last minute just to make Ash lose. Tyson doesn't even have that, he's introduced last minute to make Ash lose, does that in one of the worst battles in the anime, and the worst part is, it's a completely pointless loss, and the one that started the trend of Ash's pointless losses. Even though Ash's loss in Kanto was terrible, unfair and completely missed the point of making Ash lose due to his own mistakes and inexperience, it made sense that he would lose in his first league, even though he still ranked ridiculously high. In Johto, he progressed to the Top 8 and as mentioned before, his loss served the story extremely well. But Hoenn just started the trend of making Ash lose just for the sake of it. Ash didn't progress at all, he just lost at the top 8 again, which isn't helped by the fact Tyson is basically just Harrison, making it feel even more like a repeat, and he didn't learn anything or got inspired to go somewhere new or even got introduced to the Battle Frontier because of said loss, he just lost and that's it, and after that it's just three more regions of Ash losing just for the sake of it, two of those being some of the worst writing I've ever seen in anything, and the Hoenn loss started that trend, and I hate it for that.

The thing with him not taking his best vs Tobias was that most of his best were resting after other prior battles. Which is a nice touch that they kinda stopped doing after gen4. It made the league have a bit more weight, that Ash couldn't just use his best pokemon over and over, or they would get tired. It lets other pokemon get some screentime, and that's never a bad thing.

Ash's Sinnoh and Kalos League losses give me PTSD to this very day... The hype around those League Arcs were so high. So seeing them get cut down in such boneheaded fashions was annoying. But yeah, Cameron was another level of bad. I'm convinced the entire Unova League Arc was just the BW team giving us one last FU out of pure spite and frustration.

Agreed on Unova being the worst but I would put Sinnoh right above it since they clearly didn’t want Ash to win the league for whatever stupid reason. Hoenn would be the third from the bottom for me

Loss vs Alain, acceptable, should have been a tie though Loss vs Harrison justified should have been the finals though Lossvs Tobias, hey, sometimes this happens in real life, (should have been the finals)(looking at you, 2018 NBA finals) Loss vs Ritchie, inexperience happens Loss vs Cameron, this loss makes no sense, battle felt like a low ladder match between 10 iron valorant players

I never liked Cameron and I never will after whatever they pulled during that episode. Whenever I talked about how stupid he is and how he should've been disqualified for not having the requirement of Pokemon for a full battle, I always end up with a whole paragraph and for good reason.

What’s funny about the Cameron battle is that they didn’t even need to make a big deal about Cameron’s incompetency. The dude’s team was stacked and it makes sense that he would’ve blown out Ash, but they just had to make him the biggest idiot out there lmao

As someone who watched the original series when I was a kid, I kind of appreciate the narrative of the first two leagues. The League was meant to be this massive global event where experts from around the world come to determine who's the best of the best. Ash was an inexperienced rookie punching above his weight class, but he got far on sheer ingenuity and scrappiness, but the inexperience was ultimately what caused his downfall. Even Gary, the rival seen as unbeatable, lost to some nobody to put the competition in perspective. Next time around in Johto, both of them have really come into their own as trainers and have more powerful Pokemon and experience under their belts, resulting in the most epic and personal back and forth battle in the show. Just a theory, but Ash would have gone on to win the Silver league, but they decided Gen 2 wasn't going to be the last after all and they had to promote the new season.

That really puts it into perspective. I always went "oh Ash lost again" at Kalos while overlooking the details despite how valid that loss was. Alain was essentially a sub-main character and I kinda wish the anime would do that more often. On an unrelated note: What are these side character names? I always mix up Harrison and Morrison and almost thought "They made Ash lose to King Kai for the league?!" before I realized who you meant.

This dude is spitting straight facts. I myself was really devastated by Ash's loss against Alain and even though XY and XYZ are my favorite seasons in the entirety of the Pokemon anime, things like Ash spamming cut on his greninja was underwhelming and disappointing. BTW, I absolutely love the music included in this video. Thanks for the banger jams and banger takes!

I'm not going to lie, it really made me mad when he lost the Kalos League but then again I guess Brock was right all along! Water types are weak against fire types!

I go back and forth on whether Ritchie or Cameron gave the worst League loss but I always come to the same conclusion. Cameron's is one of the most insulting battles in the anime only beaten by Elesa. I don't think anyone even wanted Ash to win but we didn't want him to lose like this. Near the end of this battle was just slap after slap in the face for any Ash fan and I don't think Ritchie even came close.

Ash came so close so many times, in retrospect there's so many gut wrenching losses.

My opinions from least to most offensive 6: Harrison I admit I find Harrison to be a bit of a bland character besides his Blaziken, but overall, it was the loss that was the most influential to him overall, plus it gave him good encouragement to visit Hoenn for his next region 5: Alain I admit Ash should’ve won Kalos imo, but Alain was far and away the best character that beat Ash in any of these leagues and his strength was established clearly in his appearances during the Mega Evolution specials and XYZ 4: Tyson I admit I might actually prefer his character a bit more then Harrison’s personally due to him having a bit more of a personality, but Pikachu vs Meowth was a disappointing way to end his Hoenn run 3: Ritchie Team Rocket hindering Ash and the referee eliminating Squirtle for sleeping and Charizard refusing to battle sours this one big time. Ash might’ve actually won this one if it weren’t for Team Rocket truth be told 2 and 1: Tobias and Cameron Yeah I couldn’t decide which one I hated more. Tobias was just the deus ex machina to end all deus ex machinas. He was created just to have Ash lose with his random legendaries (way to force my fave Pokémon Darkrai into something I hate). Even if that battle was actually quite good in moments, I cannot forgive them for making this decision in a league that Ash should’ve won imo. And Cameron, the fact that Ash lost to probably the dumbest character in the entire series is just straight up insulting. Even if Unova Ash wasn’t the best, he deserved better then this. At least Kalos and Alola got his act together

It is weird to feel nostalgic over the decades of us collectively clowning Ash for always somehow losing while wishing for the day he wins a league but... Yeah I do feel nostalgia for those days now that he has won one (one represented in the games anyway). Though also happy that we can call the kid a champion finally lol

Even though it took him 7 Gens in order to win a League, I like that the series had Ash progressively place higher with each series showing gradual improvement. Or at least, he never placed worse than the series before.

I always loved the Harrison battle meeting blazing for the first time, it made it seem like hoenn was q huge upgrade in talent before we ever even went there 😊

Kanto was fine him to lose in, but didn’t love the Richie loss. The issue was it wasn’t a fair fight, because Ash was kidnapped before hand. Let him explain what happened, get to the pokemon center and do a fair battle tomorrow. Which I think with balbasaur, pidgeotto and Pikachu, he’d have won. Johto was a fair loss also. Lazily introduced character, but Blaziken was awesome and that league gave us the Gary v Ash match, which felt like the bigger win. Hoenn felt rushed, but the opponent was strong. I believe the reason that season felt off was there was no rival and it was a little boring. Sinnoh had the badass battle with Paul, which was the real story for that league. The Tobias thing was weird, but it was fun to watch. Unova was just a giant middle finger to everyone. Loses to an idiot in a match where the opponent only used five pokemon. Was his worst performance. Kalos was epic and brought me back into the anime. Sad he lost, but so many amazing battles and such a great character with Alain, it was worth it. All said and done, I wish he won Kalos.

The fact that they had to give a guy two legendary Pokémon just to make ash loose is crazy.

I remember being pretty salty at Ash's loss at Kalos league, but it later contributed to the story. When Alain discovered how much he contributed for Team Flare's triumph, he was crushed by grief, thinking if his fighting had any point. Ash, despite his horrible situation, never gave up and kept on fighting even helping Alain recover his determination. It ties back into older themes of the anime that titles don't make you a master and that even somebody like Alain can still improve. I'd still argue that Ash's defeat on the Johto league was the least harmful, as one of the main reasons Harrison lost was because his strongest pokémon hadn't recovered from the previous fight in time.

The losses in Hoenn and Sinnoh didn’t hit me as hard simply because the rest of the League made up for it. The Sinnoh League overall was fantastic, my personal favorite. Great battles all around, even when Paul basically wrecks Barry. In Hoenn I really enjoyed Ash’s full battle against Katie and even though I hated how the Morrison fight started, Metang vs Glalie was great as well. I forgive Kanto as the show was new and even though Kalos was devastating, the League itself was still beautiful so I can get over it. Unova is just crap though. Not even just talking about how dumb Cameron as a trainer was, the league itself sucked. It was only five episodes long (compared to the usual 6+) when you take out the ridiculous Axew episode that should have never been made in the middle of the most important arc of the series. The battles themselves were lame too. Trip was supposed to be Ash’s main rival this series and he loses in the first round in a 1-on-1…the hell!? And Bianca and Cameron’s battle was horrible as well. Two idiots battling in that one. Half of the fight was just Bianca using Iron Defense and dodging. TBH, early Unova started off great, but after the Rocket vs Plasma episodes got canceled the writers really just went all over the place.

Kanto: Very unfair to Ash. Putting aside Charizard and Team Rocket ruining everything, the whole league was a mess in general. Like really, recalling or putting to sleep counts as "unable to battle?" Johto and Hoenn: pretty fair losses, nothing offensive Sinnoh: You know Ash was so good that the only proper way the writers had him lose was by making him fight someone who had no previous appearances, no background, with action replay Unova: I'm not even gonna bother talking about this. Just WHY? Kalos: Very unclimactic and dissapointing. Our hopes and dreams shattered.

The loss against Alain was annoying on a meta-level. He didn‘t COMPLETELY get put in out of nowhere, but he might as well have been. They just needed a powerful opponent to make Ash lose the league. In the Indigo League, the anime was probably still in an experimental phase. Sleep-mechanics aside, a Pokemon that refuses to fight (Charizard) is worthless. Keep in mind that this is a huge event where people go for entertainment, kind of like wrestling.

I also don’t feel so bad about Ash’s loss to Harrison since, like you were saying, the real thematic and emotional payoff comes from the fight with Gary. It’s like… some victories are worth more than an actual trophy, y’know? Something like that. But then losing to a guy who didn’t even know he could bring six Pokémon is just embarrassing…

Ash's loss to Alain will always be the worst to me, just because it was the League where you felt like he had the chance to go all the way. Tobias was an absolutely garbage plot device but he was introduced early enough in the Sinnoh League to know Ash wasn't gonna go all the way. Cameron was an absolutely braindead moron but Ash was at his worst in Unova so he had no chance of winning that League anyway. Alain? That was what seemed like Ash's moment. All the bonding with his Greninja, all the teases against Alain and even Diantha previously, the absolutely cock tease of that episode title...it felt like it was Ash's time. Until it wasn't.

I still find the japanese version of Satoshi vs Alain to be one of the best. The VA, the animation, the choreo was all really cool and what I've been looking for in battles.

The reason why the Ash vs Richie fight feels so weird is because it's heavily censored in the anime. In the manga, when Ash's Charizard disobeyed him, it didn't just doze off, it went rogue and tried to KILL Richie's Pokémon, which is why Ash was disqualified.

The Charziard vs Blaziken fight is still one of my favorites of all time. I saw it as a kid and immediately picked Torchic when I got Ruby.

2:44 It’s kinda funny to here these words especially after seeing Alan get disrespected by Leon and his Charizard by like one move from him.

0:42 I love how Ash has a literal L on his hat. Very fitting :D

I swear when we arrived at Tyson I spoke the loudest "Who?" in my entire life. And I watched the entire anime since it started airing here in Italy.

0:56 Oh boy, that final... Even after six years I'm still mad like a beast

"Ash gambles on sending Charizard to fight Zippo." My brother in Arceus _you have a Kingler._

Normally with anime lists/discussions like this there’s somewhere I tend to have a difference of opinion, but jeez I actually agree with everything here. I do wanna comment on Ash Vs Harrison as that probably had the most intense climax possibly tied with Ash Vs Tobias because you truly didn’t know if Blaziken or Charizard Would win. Harrison had the skill and a never before seen Pokémon. And to this day the only other character to do something like that is Gary. No other trainer defeated Ash at a league with a new Pokémon after that (aside from Gary after the battle frontier with Electivire in pallet town). It would be cool to see Ash battle a gen 9 Pokémon in the Masters 8 of Journeys.

I am a huge believer that Ash's loss at the Kalos league was a last minute decision, they had been writing Ash to win, let me explain. Ash had been trying to perfect Ash-Greninja (Btw Hero Greninja is such a great name you used) and the first time he battled Alain, he lost because he hadn't perfected the form yet. Ash has never NOT defeated his rival atleast once in a series but Alain broke that rule by being the only rival Ash did not defeat directly (He did beat Leon who one shot Alain so I guess Pikachu > Mega Charizard X and therefore Pikachu>Ash-Greninja, okay I guess. But this story narrative is a huge reason why Ash seemed to be being written to win. The qualification filler episode: There is a small filler episode in XYZ where Ash battles a trainer who failed to get all 8 gym badges before the league, the guy lost to Ash and begged Ash saying "Please, you have to win, for everyone that couldn't make it". They would not have done this if Ash was not originally planned to win. The Team flare arc: The team flare arc is one of the greatest arcs in the series, great character development, heartfelt moments, badass moments, chacter arcs, the whole shebang. However the problem with this arc is how sudden it happened. The league ends with Ash losing to Alain and immediately after Team Flare attacks, not even getting the chance to let sink in the amount of bullshit that happened, so much that the anger of Ash losing the league somewhat overshadowed the start of the team flare arc. It was like they just wanted the league out of the way so they could get started with the team flare arc so they could finish up for the sun and moon anime.

Ritchie: It wasn't a fair fight, and the weird one-off rules about disqualifications don't help. Harrison: Charizard kind of loses anti-climatically, and why did Ash use Noctowl? Still, not bad. Tyson: Ash was up against a team of fully evolved mons (except for Meowth). It's surprising he did as well as he did. Tobias: As great as it is that Ash was the only one to defeat two of Tobias' Pokemon, Tobias was there just to make Ash lose. Cameron: The ultimate insult and slap in the face, it's not even a joke. Alain: Really feels like Ash was meant to win, then they decided at the last minute he shouldn't.

When i watched the ending of indigo league, i felt so sorry for Ash. One of the best moments cuz all that charizard moments had to culminate somewhere and this was the worst spot. It hurt me cuz i watched Pokemon s1 after school. It was a blast and that's why the ending is one of the saddest moments in all anime. The motto of pokemon was always, "I wanna be the very best like no one ever was." And seeing him accepting his failure killed me but gave him more layers as a protagonist. And that's why the moment where charizard listens to Ash finally in orange islands made it so sweet n satisfying to watch

I'm very disappointed when Ash lost to Alain in kalos finals but I have to agree that Ash vs Alain is one of the best animated and intense battle ever in Pokémon anime history

What's ironic is that the anime would have Iris become Unova Champion in Journeys. If the anime actually built up Iris in Best Wishes as aspiring for that goal and had her be the one to beat Ash before going on to win it might've been an improvement over Cameron taking him down.

The thing that annoyed me a lot on Ash previous regions leagues is to still have a lot of his Pokemons unevolved IN THEIR 1ST PHASE.... on the Alola games Rowlet became my favorite Pokemon because Decidueye looked so badass, but in the series Ash's Rowlet became so annoying with the Everstone bullshit and still defeating with that shenanigan good pokemons on the Alolan league. Almost his entire Unova party were first phase pokemons and lets not forget that he also tried to fight Tobias with a Gible...

Gary having 10 badges when there were only 8 is still the biggest felx in the whole pokemon anime

The Kalos loss broke my hope after so many years. That was just bulls*it. Ash was on topof his game in lore & show writing AND STILL they sc***ed him over.

I admit, I don't dip my toes into the Pokemon fandom that often, so I don't know the general consensus on most things the anime did. But this video does make me glad that someone other than me was supremely pissed off at the way the Unova League ended.

1:53 I think this moment is the ancestor of the move soak

ashs sinnoh pokemon was so broken they needed to introduce a guy with legendarys to make him lose

Alain mastered his region and that regions gimmick, testing his Mega against every Mega in the region. Ash does that in the next one with 10 million volts against gaurdian of Alola. they even really pointed that out, calling it Ash's final test against the ultimate Z move.

Putting a team of legendaries that one-shots his pokemon after his best battle ever is the most hilarious thing in this anime to me

I was never bothered by the outcome of XYZ. I had a feeling Ash was going to lose the match, just cause it's Ash. I also felt the battle was disappointing as some parts of it seem too basic or unbelievable. Like Alain owning a Weavile, the flying Pokemon tying, and Pikachu taking out too many Pokemon on its own. The Charizard Greninja battles was the best part of the whole thing.

Sinnoh has to easily be in the top 3 of strongest teams for Ash.

Alain really should’ve lost. Tbh, this felt like Ash’s first finals and felt like his 19 year arc was gonna be fulfilled. Like I would’ve expected him to hit us with Greninja, Charizard(maybe even a Mega Charizard Y which could’ve matched up with a 2nd mega Alain was hiding) Infernape, Sceptile, Pikachu, then perhaps another Kalos Pokémon, probably Goodra. Like think about, Ash could have brought in Infernape to completely counter Bisharp, neutralizing the 2nd/3rd best Pokémon with Ash’s arguably weakest Pokémon in the squad. You could have Charizard draw with the other mega. Leaving Goodra to rain dance until Charizard finish him. Then use Greninja and use the rain dance’s boost as justification for him getting the dub.

I've haven't watched an episode of pokemon since that series defining heart breaking loss to Alan

Tobias was by far the worst asspull, I think the writers realised how OP Ash’s team was by the end of Sinnoh, especially since he had access to all his previous gen Pokémon

I love that we know that Tobias didn’t beat Cynthia (or else he’d be champion). Makes me feel less bad for losing to her 5 times

Did Ash lose every Pokemon league except Alola?

In defense of the Pikachu KOing onix with thunderbolt, comparing season one Pokémon battles to the XY anime is kind of disingenuous. The first season wasn’t really about the battles, It was about the weird Hijinx that could happen in that world

I'll never get over the tobias battle. He was just put there to make sure ash lost and then the writers act like tobias never existed. Hasn't been mentioned since and he's not even in the masters 8

the fact that greninja won against sceptile and then lost against charizard was a big part of why it hurt so much

The struggle with Ash's losses for many comes from the stigma of him losing in the Kanto league many moons ago. The reason why Ash's losses are bad is because we see him go through trials and adversity with his pokemon along his journey, to struggle through many hardships and challenges and loses along the way. All to come up short when it means the most to push the product forward, not the character. Pokemon would have been better served having generational protagonists from the begining imho.

Are you sure they have acknowledged his skill.after this? He might have won the Alola league, but he never looked strong or deserving of it through almost the whole Alola arc; Guzma was the first fight in the whole Alola series where Ash looked in top form. Prior he is shown as boneheaded and mostly wins through luck, plot armour, or because Alola in the anime just doesn't have competent trainers other than Gladion, Guzma and Kukui. And after he wins its all forgotten about. I definitely thought they did a poor job of progressing him here. Hoping Journies does better, because Ash arguably looked stronger in most of these losses then he did in most of his Alola victories.

Best Wishes was painful to watch from start to finish. Not only did we see how they made Ash incompetent by completely resetting his character... but somehow keeping his achievements in the canon? And then have them tarnished was such a slap in the face of long time viewers of the show and also for Ash himself. The show was riddled with problems and had many arcs just being so unsatisfying to watch. His team had only 3 fully evolved pokemon (Leavanny, Krookadile and Unfezant). I feel as though his Pignite should've become an Emboar because as a tepig, it evolved when he confronted his former trainer and overcame his abandonment issues and it should've become even more powerful by the end of show when he had a bonding moment with Charizard. As for the rivals in the show, Unova was bloated with characters. Stefan was the friendly rival that had a running gag with his name and that's about it to his character, Bianca was Bianca from the games but strip away all of her depth and what made her interesting as a character and only exist to be a gag with only glimpses of what could’ve been. Trip is a rival in name only. He sucks. He's not as interesting as Paul or Gary, you hardly see him, he beats Ash's Pikachu with a Snivy in its first battle and is somehow more competent than Ash even though he has WAY more experience than Trip. He always loses in the first round in every tournament arc (except the one that was about facing Alder at the end) and he's supposed to be Ash's main rival?? And then we finally get to Cameron. He is such a stupid plot device, I refuse to refer to Cameron as a character. He is completely incompetent as a trainer despite having a goddamn Hydreigon on his team! The kid thinks the unova league takes place in jhoto somehow, he thinks that he only needs 7 badges to enter the league, he thinks that you have to just show up to be able to enter said league and thinks that you need 5 pokemon to enter a full battle. Like... How can he not know this ANY of this?! Even other rookie trainers know way more than him and yet he somehow makes it all the way to the finals. Don't even get me started on the deus ex machina that is his Riolu evolving into Lucario mid-battle and sweeping Ash. Ash was done dirty in BW and I'm glad that the anime moved away from that horrendous version of him. No matter what, Ash should always be progressing, not regressing. BW was supposed to be a soft reboot for the franchise but you can't do that and keep his accomplishments. Making Ash inept at Pokemon training was a betrayal to his character and to his achievements.

The Alola League win was so bittersweet. It was a good win for the specific series, but because of that win we’ll be forever robbed of a league win that highlights Ash’s journey as a whole across all series.

"it's bullshit that they had a guy who's team was mostly legendaries" i mean at least 2 of the frontier brains were like that and i'm pretty sure one of them was basically the wall that ash hit in the battle frontier.

Honestly my favorite KZfaqr to watch while playing Pokémon

Honestly most of Ash's league rivals weren't even characters, their sole purpose was to prevent Ash from winning and then never be seen or heard from again outside the region they debut in, essentially making them plot devices. Alain is the only league rival that was actually an actual character imo and is the only one that'll likely return in future regions or episodes.

I know it is a hated battle in the community overall in the leagues. But Pikachu and Latios still gives me the chill. Like, Ash knew he had lost. He turned around his hat and went with his partner: and they gave it their all, And Pikachu beat Latios. And Ash beat 2 Pokémon of his when no one else could even get through one. Was that trainer being there absolutely bonkers? Yeah. Totally. But Pikachu vs Latios is one of my top 5 one on one battles in the anime. For reference, other 4 are: Infernape vs Electivire, Charizard vs Blastoise, Charizard vs Entei in the movie 2000, and Pikachu vs Raichu in the Lt Surge gym battle

I agree with the Hoenn league being rushed, but Tyson at least seemed like a competent trainer, so for Ash to lose in a close race was pretty good. Especially since arguably, calling grovile to fight a steel type was a pretty big blunder. Tyson's Meowth was also not just a "I beat Ash to stop him" level of strength and was shown to be pretty strong, knocking out a Persian earlier. There is no amount of anger that can cover how I feel about that loss to Camreon, this guy sees a pignite and thinks "Ferrothorn should be a great match up" when he has a swanna.

Ash's loss to Alain was just BS. Alain needed to lose more than Ash. He believed he was invincible practically. He was coming off as too OP and needed the loss. Plus, the story just felt like it was building up to Ash finally winning and defeating Alain's OP Mega Charizard X. I mean all those losses to Alain before and finally mastering the Ash-Greninja form before the league? It really felt like he was going to win. It was the worst decision they ever made.

"How Bad Were Ash's League Losses ACTUALLY?" UNFORTUNATELY

I like how the series basically tells people that no matter how hard you try your dreams will never come true.

I always hated that Ash had to go through all those tough gym battles (sometimes some of them took episodes to finish, or Ash had to fight them another time), only to be stomped in the most stupidest ways possible come the champion leagues

That loss to tobias was such a slap in the face by the writers like really? His first semifinal appearance and it’s against a dude with legendary Pokémon, the kalos one disappointed me also since the Japanese version leaked that he would win but it was a helluva match but sooooooo painful