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Home » ZZ’s Little Blog » Pokémon Year Review in 2023: Investing, Scandals, & LGBTQ+ Community

Pokémon Year Review in 2023: Investing, Scandals, & LGBTQ+ Community

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Pokemon 151

Yo–ZZISCO here! I hope y’all are pumped for what 2024 has to bring! I got back into Pokémon in January 2023 as a form of recovery for myself. In doing so, I bought me and my partner an Elite Trainer Box of Crown Zenith, without any prior knowledge. After opening, we pulled some of the top cards in the set. At the time, they were worth over $200, thus the excitement hit me hard! As I became more introduced to the Pokémon community, there are some interesting things that happened in the year 2023, so that’s why I’m writing this blog post today! 

Investing

Can Pokémon cards be a form of investing? Indubitably! However, I would suggest you to max out your Roth IRA (depending on your age), as opposed to buying a crapload of Pokémon stuff. Because at the end of the day, Pokémon could collapse and everything could be worthless.

Regardless, when I was getting into Pokémon last year, I wish I knew which were the hot products to buy and hold to eventually sell in the future. Nevertheless, here are some products to keep your eye on in 2024. As a side note, I’ll be utilizing TCGPlayer, which is a phenomenal resource to understand market prices for trading cards (e.g., Pokemon, Yugioh, One Piece, etc.).

Evolving Skies

Evolving Skies is a set within Pokémon, which released on August 27th 2021. Within this set there are 5 cards over $130, where the top card is currently $540, which is an Umbreon. So, if you see anything Evolving Skies, it may be a gnarly pick up to hold for some years, as others will be wanting to rip packs to chase those big cards.

Some realistic places you might be able to find Evolving Skies is at Walgreens. They sometimes have a pin collection with Evolving Skies and Chilling Rein. Otherwise, checking your local Wal-Mart when they restock the Pokémon stuff could be another way. This could happen during the weekdays around 9am-12pm (obviously it varies greatly depending on region). 

Pokemon Center Exclusive Elite Trainer Boxes (ETB)

How much more exclusive can it get when it comes directly from the Pokémon Center? When you purchase a Pokémon Center Exclusive ETB from the Scarlet & Violet Era, it comes with a stamped promo card. Not to mention, they come with more goodies than the typical ETBs that you’ll find at retail stores. It’s also important to mention that 6 out 7 Pokémon Center Exclusive ETBs in the Scarlet & Violet Era are sold out already. Exclusivity is what drives demand, right?

Charizard Ultra Premium Collection

When the average person thinks of Pokémon they might think of Pikachu or Charizard. Nevertheless, Charizard is obviously one of the most iconic Pokémon within the whole franchise. So, an ultra premium collection box starring Charizard is a no brainer, especially as this product comes with 3 Charizard promo cards. For reference, when this product dropped on October 28, 2022, it was sold out nearly everywhere and prices skyrocketed to almost triple MSRP. At release, the MSRP for this product was $119.99. Right now the market price for this product is $110.00 due to the Pokémon Center printing this product to demand. Nevertheless, in 3-5 years this is one of those products that will unequivocally go up in value.

Blake’s Breaks and Whatnot Scams

When I got back into Pokémon, I continued to see advertisements for the app Whatnot. After checking it out, it’s basically carnival games for Pokémon. When you think of carnival games, do you think of the games as being fair or rigged? Well for Blake Martinez (former NFL player), it appeared that he took advantage of his clientele by having rigged games that were unwinnable. This led to him being permanently banned from Whatnot. Instead of writing a lengthy review of what happened, one Pokemon YouTuber named Pokémon Rattle did a 26 part series of the scandal. It was so big, that it made Blake Martinez unretire from the NFL and made him forget all about Pokémon. *sad face*

Rattle Pokemon – Even Former NFL Players Will Scam You on Whatnot

Pronoun Slip-Up at a Regional Tournament

Makani Tran, a teenager being streamed live during his match at the Regional Pokémon Tournament, was asked what his pronouns were by a non-binary judge. When he answered, Makani Tran nervously laughed, which appeared light and brief, as he answered. This made the judge feel “unsafe.” Therefore, despite Makani Tran being 5-0 in the tournament, the judge who is a grown adult, felt unsafe from a minor and used their power to disqualify Makani Tran despite all the money and hard work he put into being at the regional tournament.

Makani Tran and Alex Schemanske. (Photo: Pokémon Trading Card Game)

I’m 100% in the belief that you should use someone’s preferred pronouns as a courtesy for those individuals, however to feel nervous is a natural human response and a nervous laughter is a common defense mechanism for humans. The huge thing about this from my perspective, is that grown adults kicked out a minor in a city that he doesn’t reside in, as he was visiting from out of town for the tournament just because he nervously laughed and they felt “unsafe.” Abusing one’s power to discriminate against someone is never okay regardless of what community you belong to. What kind of world are we living in where grown adults feel offended and feel unsafe because of a normal human response? In my opinion, this is dangerous and sad for our society.

New Fun Set to Open: Scarlet & Violet 151

If you’re a 90s baby like ya boy– then there’s a fun set you could open, called Scarlet & Violet 151. Within this set, it spotlights the original 151 Pokémon but with new iconic art. Not only is this set fun to open, but you have the potential to open up an expensive card like the Charizard EX, which has a current market price of $120. This set has brought back some of the OG collectors back into the scene. 

One important thing to note if you’re new to collecting Pokemon, this set is a specialty set, thus there’s no booster box to rip open. A booster box has 36 packs and typically is the most cost-effective way to open cards, as there’s not extra ancillary products like dice or card sleeves, etc. So, since 151 is a speciality set, the most cost effective way to open packs would be to find these booster bundles, as they have only packs without anything extra. The catch here is that these booster bundles are hard to find. If you find booster bundles out in the wild (e.g., Wal-Mart, Target, Barnes & Noble, etc.), they may be a good pickup to keep sealed or to rip open.

In Closing

I hope this blog post was somewhat enjoyable or at the bare minimum helped you escape reality for a bit. If you are getting back into collecting Pokémon, one big suggestion I can give y’all is having collection goals, so you don’t overspend or over collect! I’m wishing everyone nothing but the best for 2024–cheers!