The biggest Pokémon card theft in history is allegedly causing drama

It definitely looks like someone might have stolen a A collection of rare Fusion Strike cards From The Pokémon Company. According to evidence that emerged from the Dallas-based Pokémon trading card community, the alleged thief attempted to sell them to a local store only for them to be turned over to The Pokémon Company in what the store calls “the largest returns for stolen property to date” in trading card game history.

Details of the apparent theft began leaking from the closed Pokémon World Facebook group to Reddit over the weekend. Image showing piles of valuable Fusion Strike cards, from fully technical trainers to VMAX Mews, Espeons, and Gengars covering the table, exploded quickly on r/PokemonTCG. “Saw this on an FB group, a printing company worker allegedly stole a bat off the line and tried to offload it to LGS,” the GuavaWave poster wrote on Reddit on April 15.

The next day, GuavaWave is back With the participation of a statement From Trading Card World (TCW), the card store the alleged thief apparently tried to sell the cards to. TCW said it was immediately suspicious of the draw, believing that the only way someone could get such a concentrated number of rare cards from a single deck is by faking or stealing them. When asked, the seller apparently revealed that he works for a Pokémon card printing company. TCW says it immediately notified The Pokémon Company, which conducted its own investigation and recovered the stolen cards.

The statement continues:

5: The Pokémon Corp. has acknowledged Trading Card World for its critical contribution to recovering these stolen items. This was the largest return of stolen property to date.

6: Trading Card World has been asked to keep this information confidential while an active investigation is underway. In connection with this request, TCW has kept this story and its significant share out of the limelight.

Read more: Most wanted cards and value in Scarlet Pokemon & Violet TCG

That might have been the end of the story, except that collectors and fans have long accused Fusion Strike, a 2021 expansion, of owning Some of the worst withdrawal rates In modern pokemon card history. Some rare cards like Alternate Art Vmax Mew It was appreciated Being four times more difficult to obtain than the Most Wanted cards in other recent expansions. data It was anecdotal At best, but it has become an entrenched wisdom for some in the community. It all came in the midst of the game’s post-Covid explosion, which is when the Pokémon Company was New cards cannot be printed fast enough to keep up with demand.

That’s why, after discovering Fusion Strike’s potential massive heist, some fans and collectors have blamed why the collection’s draw rates are so bad. Although there is no evidence that stolen cards deprived some booster packs of rare items that they might otherwise have contained, some initially saw them as vindication of long-held suspicions. One player on the subreddit suggested it doesn’t matter. Either the bad withdrawal rates were on purpose or influenced by the alleged theft. Either way, the damage is done.

The Pokémon Company and Trading Card World did not immediately respond to requests for comment.