Man, remember when Snorlax was so good that an entire generation's Smogon OU was centered around it? It could Curse up, throwing out Earthquakes and Double Edges that would break teams in half while becoming impenetrable itself because Fighting types were mediocre-to-bad in Gen II (you had to get lucky with a critical Cross-Chop from Machamp or simply eat shit) and when it did take damage from an exploding Cloyster, Forretress, Exeggutor, or (lol) Gengar, it'd just Rest it off. It was the best RestTalker, an astounding Belly Drummer, and could even learn Flamethrower or Fire Blast if you were sick of dealing with pesky Steely phazers that shrugged off your EQ/DEs (namely Skarmory). It was a god in competitive Pokemon, and 100% worth picking up in-game even if it was in the far back half, because that fucker had the
other Leftovers.
Anyway, I wonder what Snorlax is up to these days.
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See, that's how you make an argument like this, you show a Pokemon that actually was good and show how it's dropped in popularity.
But even then, note one particular line.
It could Curse up, throwing out Earthquakes and Double Edges that would break teams in half while becoming impenetrable itself because Fighting types were mediocre-to-bad in Gen II (you had to get lucky with a critical Cross-Chop from Machamp or simply eat shit)
Snorlax wasn't an OU threat simply because of it's own merits. Snorlax was an OU threat because Fighting types took several generations to become even decent, meaning it was a tank without a weakness.
As soon as good fighting types started making their presence known, snorlax began dropping in popularity. and it was slow and gradual, too.
There's another interesting OU pokemon from gen 1 and 2 to look at. One that went from UUBL in RSE (unpopular in OU but too good for UU) all the way down to NU in Gen 4.
That would be Jynx.
The reason for it's perilous drop is simple: Sucker Punch. Jynx always had sweeper-like stats even in gen 1, and a lot of that crippling overspecialisation with paper-thin physical defenses. But it's Ice and Psychic typing, combined with the Physical/Special being aligned to types, meant that darks and fires were working off Special and there wasn't a lot of Pokemon that could combine a jynx weakness with the bulk or speed to punish it.
As soon as the physical/special split came in, Jynx crumpled like a paper towel.
There's another reason worth discussing. Why Jynx and Snorlax ruled those early OU tiers.
Their stats aren't like, say, Charizard, Pidgeot, or Beedrill. They're not well-rounded at all.
They both have the crazy, spiky, overspecialised stats everyone else is complaining about being prevalent more with modern Pokemon.
Specialisation is, has always been, and will always be the best way to rule the roost in competitive Pokemon. Always. The only exceptions are Pokemon with high enough BSTs that they don't need to cripple anything for it.
R Pidgeot and other garbage need some of the love GF has for Zacian and Charizard sent it's way.
