A Jungle Snorlax PSA 10 Now Sells for More Than a 1st Edition Charizard PSA 9

A 1st Edition Jungle Snorlax in PSA 10 sold for $180,000 at Fanatics Collect on Oct. 18, six days after two 1st Edition Base Set Charizards in PSA 9 sold on eBay for $124,950 and $125,000. Last fall it ran the other way: a Snorlax 10 sold for $24,100 on eBay in September 2025 while Charizard 9s sold around $42,100. Not bad for a Pokémon whose main job is sleeping across Route 12.

The Snorlax isn't a one-off. I pulled every sale of 19 graded 1st Edition and shadowless cards from Base Set, Jungle, Fossil and Team Rocket, then compared last fall to this fall one grade at a time. Nearly every card went up, but what stands out is how much more collectors now pay to move up a single grade.

Moving up from a PSA 8 got expensive

Last fall, trading a PSA 8 up to a PSA 9 roughly doubled what you paid for most of these cards. This fall it roughly triples it, with the gap wider on 15 of the 17 cards we charted.

The Snorlax is the extreme case. Its PSA 9 cost about two and a half PSA 8s last fall, $1,244 against $483. No Snorlax 9 has sold under $9,600 since Oct. 11, while the best PSA 8 this month went for $2,550.

A Jungle Flareon PSA 9 that cost about two PSA 8s last fall now costs about three and a half, around $2,105 against $568 for the 8.

One Snorlax for the price of three Eeveelutions

If you want all three Jungle Eeveelutions in PSA 9, a Flareon, a Vaporeon and a Jolteon will run you around $6,651 together this month. That's still less than any Snorlax 9 has sold for since Oct. 11. Last fall the whole trio cost $1,588, only $344 more than one Snorlax 9.

Team Rocket gems are the bargain 10s

The jump from a PSA 9 to a 10 is where the sets split apart. A Jungle or Fossil holo in PSA 10 now sells for about 13 to 18 times its 9, with the Fossil Dragonite at the low end and the Snorlax at the top. The Team Rocket 1st Edition holos run about 6 to 9 times. A Dark Charizard 10 sells around $34,800 against $3,920 for a 9.

Supply is part of the story. PSA has graded 555 Dark Charizard 10s, the most on the list, against just 76 for the Snorlax.

Team Rocket's Dark Flareon is the budget evil twin. A gem copy of the non-holo sold for $675 to $800 this month, while a Jungle Flareon 10 went for $25,800 on Oct. 18.

The Jungle Flareon is the one I'm watching. Its 10 cost about nine PSA 9s last fall and about 18 now. After auctions of $31,800 to $55,200 in the second week of October, one sold for $25,800 at Fanatics Collect on Oct. 18. That matters if you're the collector who pulled a Flareon 10 out of a $1,000 Grailbreak pack Thursday night. I'd let that price find a floor before paying up for one.

I left the Fossil Lapras 10 out of the math. Last November two copies sold $17,000 apart in the same week, $24,600 at Fanatics Collect and $7,500 on eBay. This month two sold at Fanatics Collect for $26,400 and $24,600.

Same dragon, different price

The Fossil Dragonite and the Team Rocket Dark Dragonite are about as scarce in a 10, with 236 and 223 graded, yet a Fossil Dragonite 10 sells around $45,600 this fall against around $26,400 for the Dark one.

Their PSA 9s sit much closer, about $3,524 for the Fossil and $2,817 for the Dark. If you want a gem Dragonite on the shelf, I'd take the Dark one and keep the $19,000.

Shadowless buyers are paying for the name, not the grade

The shadowless Base Set holos barely joined the grade chase. A shadowless Venusaur PSA 9 cost about two PSA 8s last fall and still does, around $1,900 against $894. The shadowless Charizard's gap even shrank a little, from about 1.9 times to 1.8.

Here the Charizard name does most of the selling. A shadowless Charizard PSA 8 still sells around $6,199, more than a Dark Charizard PSA 9 at around $3,920. The two smallest PSA 9 gains on the list belong to shadowless holos, with the Venusaur up 64% since last fall and the Charizard about 57% against 684% for the Snorlax. Only two shadowless Charizard 9s have sold this fall.

Where I'd buy: the Jungle PSA 8s

The 8s have trailed the 9s by a few months all year. Fifteen of the 18 PSA 9s started climbing between December and February, while 10 of the 19 PSA 8s waited until March, April or May.

That makes the Jungle 8s the cheap seat, with the Snorlax 8 already on the move. Copies were selling for $1,210 to $1,269 earlier in October. Then four went for $1,380 to $2,550 on Oct. 18. The Snorlax 8 is the one I'd grab first, with a Flareon 8 around $568 close behind.