In the world of Pokémon today, there are 802 to choose from and your favorites say a lot about you and your battle strategy. When we were kids in the 90’s, we had only the original 150 from which to build our teams. Looking at all the choices you can make today, it can be a little daunting to decide which are worth keeping around. Despite that, the original 150 Pokémon are just as viable today as they were back then. It is the goal of this list to give your our opinion of some of the worst and the unsung heroes of the Pokémon world from the land of Kanto.
On this list, I’ll be drawing from both personal experiences with the first three games and statistics from major Pokémon informative sites to help us decide who are really some of the worst and the hidden gems that most people don’t think of when building their teams. I know that not everyone will agree with every decision we make on this list, but let’s hope that of the 802 Pokémon you can choose from, you might give some of the ones from the older generations a second look. So let get right into it!
20 Nobody Should Pick: Eevee
I always remember my friends referencing Eevee as the non-electric Pikachu, due to them having very similar skills. Mind you, we didn’t know about the elemental stones that would change an Eevee to Jolteon, Flareon, and Vaporeon, respectively. Without the internet to guide us, we actually found out about this through an episode of the anime.
This left us with one question after: why would you keep an Eevee when you could have one of the evolutions?
It isn’t particularly strong and its moveset is pretty limited to simple attacks like Tackle and Quick Attack. Learning now that Eevee has even more ways to evolve there is really no reason for having a base Eevee, as it is a waste of potential especially with much better “Normal Type” Pokémon out there. Besides having one of the cutest Pokémon in Kanto, there is little reason to keep one.
19 Underrated: Onix
Even though Onix was not able to evolve in the first generation, it was a very solid Pokémon, no pun intended. Through the use of Bind, Rock Throw and Slam, Onix was not only great on offense, but had one of the highest defense stats in the game. His health pool is low but with that high of a defense, it is no wonder that Brock was so hard to defeat in his gym.
We all can remember struggling to defeat Brock over and over until we finally trained your Pokémon to be on his level.
So when I found my first Onix, I had to have one, no matter what and, for the most part, I was never disappointed in keeping him around until the Indigo Plateau fights at the very end of the game.
18 Nobody Should Use: Seadra
Seadra, the straw nosed seahorse, is a surprisingly defensive Pokémon whose stats can be a bit deceiving. Its two biggest moves are Water Gun and Bubble, all the way until level 52 when it learns Hydro Pump. Do not get us wrong, Hydro Pump is an amazing move for water Pokémon, but waiting that long into the game before you move on from Bubble as your best offense?
If you want to wait on a water Pokémon to get better with time, you might as well grind your Magikarp to a Gyarados and be king of the ocean.
Not to mention that even with modern games you cannot just evolve a Seadra by natural means, you need a Dragon Scale, but in the originals, there is no Kingdra to evolve to, so keeping Seadra to the end is not likely.
17 Underrated: Nidoking
I know there are a lot of fans of Nidoking out there, but now that we have reached 802 Pokémon, we do not see him around as often as we should. He has high stats over every category with a slight boost in attack, making him one of the most well-rounded offensive based Pokémon in the first generation.
With moves available like Horn Attack, Horn Drill, Fury Attack, Double Kick and even Thrash, that just seals the deal on this monster.
Not to mention he looks big and mean to boot! Do not let his purple scales fool you, as this poisonous horned dinosaur is a beast. Even the Pokédex’s throughout all the games talk of him toppling radio towers and breaking diamonds with his horn.
16 Nobody Should Pick: Mr. Mime
Mr. Mime is hands down the strangest humanoid Pokémon in generation 1. Just to get him, you used to need to trade the man at Route 2 an Abra for one. We covered my thoughts on Abras, so it’s an easy trade, right? Well… not really, as it would be better to keep the Abra to evolve since Mr. Mime relies on the Confusion move all the way until level 31, just to get Double Slap. That’s a long time to get a little back. His Special Attack and Special Defence are nearly off the charts, but with little offensive ability, the defense becomes next to useless.
In our opinion, Mr. Mime is good for that Pokédex count and nothing else.
Save that Abra or capture a second one but leave that Mr. Mime on the PC.
15 Underrated: Nidoqueen
Every good king needs his queen and arguably Nidoqueen overshadows Nidoking by having even more balanced stats that are just as high. Her attack is slightly lower, but her health pool and defense is slightly higher. The Pokédex mentions several times throughout the games how hard her armor-like scales are and, just like Nidoking, she has poisonous horns. During my first run through of Pokémon as a kid, I took Nidoking to the end, but now I always take Nidoqueen. The reason why is simple, her moveset: Body Slam, Bite, Double Kick and Fury Swipes. Those four moves together make for a very viable and scary opponent to face at any level. She is one scary mamma that you do not want to get on the bad side of.
14 Nobody Should Pick: Abra
Anyone that has played the original games knows how hard it is to catch an Abra, as at every opportunity they will attempt to just teleport away.
Teleport’s only function is to have a high chance to leave the battle, but is an Abra really worth getting?
This is one of the few Pokémon I will try to evolve because of how good Kadabra is, but this can be a long and frustrating road. Your only hope to level it and keep your sanity is to teach it a move using a TM. The most frustrating thing about Abra is that in the older games you most likely will never see it become an Alakazam due to them needing to be traded to evolve them. Even though Kadabra is pretty good, not being able to take that next step makes it hard to justify the means.
13 Underrated: Snorlax
Weighing in at over 1000 pounds and just shy of 7 feet tall is Snorlax. A personal favorite of mine, this massive road blocking bear is almost always found sleeping or eating. You might think finding a hibernating bear in your path would be scary enough, but one that weighs a ton!? Thankfully, if you did find one, it is likely to be too lazy to do anything about your disturbance. But if he did decide to shake off his sleep and fight, he can use Headbutt, Body Slam, and even Hyper Beam! Enough said. A giant sumo wrestler panda that can shoot lasers out of its eyes? Good enough for us. Let’s face it, Snorlax is a 1000 lbs of snuggly pain.
12 Nobody Should Pick: Chansey
I am just going to say it, I am not a huge fan of Pokémon whose main strategy is putting their opponents to sleep. That being said, Chansey has always felt like just another Jigglypuff -ike Pokémon. Chansey puts people to sleep then uses Pound or Double Slap and that is her in a nutshell (which is exactly the same thing that Jigglypuff does).
To top it all off, Chansey’s highest level move is Double Edge, which harms her for half of the damage she inflicts on her opponent.
There are a lot of people like her, but having Double Edge as her final learned attack and using a sleep then hit strategy, means you could use Jigglypuff interchangeably.
11 Underrated: Kingler
You might be thinking a crab, really? Well, yeah! Have you seen the attack and defense stats on this king crab? His speed stat is not too bad either and what he lacks elsewhere gives him some of the best toe to toe fighting stats in the water Pokémon kingdom. Sure, he is no Gyarados, but he has a unique move called Crabhammer that has this high critical damage chance and when it happens you will never second guess its power again.
Being backed up by Stomp, Vice Grip, and Harden if need be, he is not your average royal crustacean.
Just do not let this one pinch you, as the Pokédex claims he can pinch with 1,000 horsepower. Which would make his pinch one million, five hundred thousand pounds per square inch of crushing force, realistically.
10 Nobody Should Pick: Farfetch’d
This Pokémon is really something different. He’s a duck who welds a leak plant as a sword and its name is basically far-fetched. It is a very strange design of a creature. There has to be some kind of anime inside joke that I just do not understand here. It is actually decently strong, assuming you are able to use the buffs he possesses before you attack, but the design of Farfetch’d just throws me off and I can not convince myself into keeping it for long. Plus its health pool leaves a little to be desired. We just find the idea of a samurai-style duck smacking around other Pokémon is kind of far-fetched. Sorry, we could not resist poking fun at the name one last time.
9 Underrated: Haunter/Gengar
To be clear, we’re combining this entry because Gengar is stuck in the “you have to trade to evolve” limbo. Hunter’s Special Attack stat is phenomenal as well, as his high speed for those quick first hits. It is also one of the few Pokémon that can use Dream Eater ability, which is only usable on sleeping opponents, but heals Haunter for 50% of the damage caused. You might be saying: “But wait, you said you do not like the sleep then hit combos.”
With a move that strong, you have to appreciate the sinister nature that is tucked into Pokémon that’s often forgotten.
Gengar, if you can get your hands on one, is exactly the same, but better in every way, so we could not leave him out.
8 Nobody Should Pick: Kakuna
One of the first Pokémon you see evolve is bound to be either Weedle or Caterpie. Weedle will evolve into a Kakuna at level 7 and learns “Harden” as a skill. This specific Pokémon is not terrible, but the Kakunas that are dreadful will be found in the tall grass. These Kakunas only know the one move: Harden. This makes them an easy target to train your team with, but since they only use Harden, they become harder to defeat, wasting the number of times you can use attacks. This leaves your fledgling team open to an unprepared fight with the other trainers in the area, or alternatively, you can go all the way back to town to heal up at the Poké Center. Either way, you are bound to find an occasion Kakuna that can use poison sting, but you can find some below level 7, so why bother?
7 Underrated: Tauros
Tauros is a bull with whip-like tails that it uses to whip itself to charge even faster at its opponent. Side note, I grew up on a ranch and having a bull charge at you is terrifying, no less if it can whip itself to go faster. It’s sporting shocking speed and attack stats, so that you can almost always get in the heavy first hit in or get the rage move off so that with each hit he takes, he does more damage. Not to mention, his health pool and defense are above average as well. Combine that with Stomp or Take Down and Tauros will just keep doing more damage until he runs down whatever is in front of him. His one downfall is he does not have a lot of moves to choose from, but you can add some heavy hitting TMs on him if you feel so inclined.
6 Nobody Should Pick: Metapod
Metapod, the cocoon looking Pokémon, is very similar to Kakuna in basically every way, except instead of the possibility of having Poison Sting, it can have the move Tackle. When it comes to being able to use a Normal Type move vs a move that can add status effects, most prefer to roll the dice and end up with a poisoned enemy. Of course, this doesn’t work every time and Bug Type moves can do minimal damage to many different kinds of enemies. Even taking this into account, Metapod is just inferior to Kakuna, not only in its third evolution, but also its second. Similarly, you will be tempted to use these wild Pokémon to gain experience, but time after time you’ll waste your moves that could be more efficiently used against trainers in the area. Honestly, just use another Pokémon entirely, unless you want the almighty status effects of Butterfree.
5 Underrated: Exeggutor
Exeggutor is a group of half broken eggs that turned into a coconut tree whose coconuts can fall off and become eggs again. That’s actually what is Pokédex entries say. It has pretty balanced stats, besides a low speed and extremely high special attack stat, making his Leech Seed attack that much better at self-healing. You really can have a lot of fun with this one, as Exeggutor’s Barrage move is very risk/reward, but combined with your favorite plant-based status effect move, like Sleep Powder or Poison Powder, making him dangerous. If you felt so inclined, you could keep the move Solarbeam to deliver that haymaker after a charging turn.
Exeggutor is goofy, tough and makes no sense but we can’t help but love everything about it.
Not to mention he can also be slightly stronger by making it into a tree dragon hybrid in the newer games.
4 Nobody Should Pick: Jynx
Ok, what exactly is a Jynx? A humanoid gypsy Pokémon? An opera singer Pokémon? Whatever Jynx is, she is actually a powerhouse, but at the cost of low defense. A glass cannon, if you will, that only gets more powerful moves as time goes on. With moves like Body Slam and Blizzard, she can be an extremely heavy hitter. So why is she on this list? Just look at her, what is that? The Pokédex says things like she dances around and it causes people to dance against their will or that her crying sounds like she is speaking a human language that no one knows. Plus she is known to saunter up and lick people, creeping them out so bad they can not move. That is just plain bizarre, more so than the ghosts in Lavender Town.
3 Underrated: Rhydon
Rhydon is slow lumbering anthropomorphic rhino with a drill for a horn that is known for shattering diamonds at slower spinning speeds. He also has armor-like skin that can withstand the heat of molten lava!?
With some of the highest Health Pools, Defence stat, and Attack stat combinations in the game, he is not to be trifled with.
Having lower Special Attack, Special Defence, and Speed is his only downfall. Depending on his level, he can instantly cause an opponent to feint with Horn Drill, or just use Stomp, Furry Attack or Horn Attack. Rhydon was one of the few Pokémon that never left my group after I evolved one from a Rhyhorn and he was there the first time I was able to defeat the Indigo Plateau. We have a great emotional bond because of it!
2 Nobody Should Pick: Magikarp
Many people will see this and think “of course Magikarp is on this list,” and everyone knows why. He is literally useless until level 15 when he learns Tackle. Magikarp’s only other move it can learn is Splash and the effect of Splash is that it literally does nothing. Magikarp cannot even learn a single HM or TM. The only thing going for poor Magikarp is that it can be found easily and, of course, everyone knows at this point that when it evolves… it evolves into Gyarados, the wingless, yet flying sea dragon! But we did not know that as kids, so we never bothered keeping it around. Little did we know, we held the key to one of the strongest all-around water Pokémon in the game. Holding on to a Magikarp itself would be a massive waste of time if not for its evolution.
1 Underrated: Machamp
I know there is a lot of the “field monster” category of Pokémon on this list, but honestly, we have saved one of the best for last. Machamp was with me since it was only a low-level Machop and, ever since then, it never let me down. Machamp has a massive Attack Stat, great Health Pool, and Good Defense.
It may be a tad on the slower side, but that never seemed to stop the wrecking ball that is Machamp.
Always make sure that he has Seismic Toss which does damage equal to the Pokémon’s level itself. Keeping low kick always helps, as it tends to do a lot of damage to larger sized opponents. It can also be very beneficial to teach him Body Slam and Mega Kick just to hammer home the fighter feel of this Pokémon.
