The Pokémon anime has been running for 27 years. That’s a pretty damn long time for a kid to not even be considered a teenager yet. Over the course of the franchise, main character Ash (or Satoshi, depending on what side of the pond you’re on) has taken on many challenges in his quest to become a Pokémon Master. What it means to be a Pokémon Master is nebulous at best. But, anyone who has played a mainline Pokémon game will tell you that the primary goal is to collect Gym Badges and become the region’s Champion. To do this, the player needs to defeat the Gym Leaders, the Elite Four, and the current champion in battle.

A common criticism of the anime is that Ash doesn’t actually earn a lot of his badges. This happened frequently in the first couple of seasons. Ash and friends would save the day in some way, and Ash gets the badge as a thank-you. That begs the following questions:

1. How many Gym Leaders did Ash actually fight?
2. How many Elite Four members did Ash fight?
3. How many awards did Ash actually earn?

I’d like to make this a series covering every major region and League introduced. For a win to count and an award to be earned fairly, we are going off of the games’ rules; 

Ash must battle and defeat the Gym Leader, Elite Four member, or Champion. A trainer is defeated if their Pokémon is unable to fight (either by knockout or refusal), or the trainer forfeits the battle.

Since Ash doesn’t face all the canon opponents in the same season, I’m going to be counting future encounters with them, as long as they do battle and there is a definitive winner.

The first two seasons of the Pokémon anime cover the Kanto region, Orange Islands, and Indigo League. The Orange Islands are not in any of the mainline games, but they bear mentioning for reasons I’ll get into later. Ash starts his journey the same as any other trainer; getting his starter Pokémon, learning how to battle, and catching Caterpies and such. He travels to the main cities in the region to train his team and gets 8 badges to qualify for the Indigo League championships.

The Indigo League in the anime is a single-elimination tournament, rather than a gauntlet of 4 powerful trainers and the current reigning Champion. Ash meets all the canon Indigo League members, though not all at the Indigo Conference, and not all in the same season.

After competing at the Indigo Plateau, Ash and friends go to the Orange Islands. The Orange League gyms work differently in that trainers don’t have regular Pokémon battles. Sometimes they undergo a series of tests, or battle with unusual (for the time) conditions. Only by passing the tests are badges given out. The Orange League isn’t a thing in any of the games, so I’m glossing over it, but it’s notable for two reasons.

1. This arc is where Ash encounters and battles Elite Four member, Lorelei (named Prima in the English dub).
2. The Orange League is the first league where Ash earned all badges and the championship fairly.

Of the eight Kanto Gym Leaders, Ash met and fought all eight of them, but the situation with the 8th badge is weird and still contested by fans to this day. Giovanni, leader of both the Viridian Gym and Team Rocket, needed to leave for “reasons.” So, he appointed his three worst underlings as Gym Leaders in his absence, and allowed them to use his Pokémon. Ash did battle temporary Gym Leader Jessie, and did win fairly. Ash would not battle Giovanni himself until much later. So, if we’re going off of “Battle the Gym Leader” criteria, then Ash did face all the canon Gym Leaders. For our purposes here, however, we’re going to say Ash earned his last badge fairly, since Giovanni appointed Jessie and James as Gym Leaders.

For the Indigo League, Ash only defeated one person. Again, this is weird territory, since Ash doesn’t defeat Gary until a later season. Also, Gary placed lower than Ash during the Indigo Conference. But, since Gary aka Professor Oak’s grandson is the canon Champion of the Gen I games, I’m counting it. That being said, in the games, you can’t pick and choose which Pokémon League member to fight. You either face all 5 one after another, or you don’t finish the game.

Based on the rule of “Defeat the Gym Leader in battle,” Ash fairly earned four of the eight Kanto Badges. For the Indigo League, based on the rule of “Defeat the Elite Four and the Champion,” Ash did not earn a place in the Indigo Hall of Fame.

Fans of the series say that Ash didn’t earn many of the badges he was given, and that he’s a terrible Trainer, even as far as rookies go. In doing my research for this post, I’m inclined to agree. Based solely on the rule of “defeat the Gym Leader in battle,” Ash only earned half of the Kanto badges fairly, and got his ass handed to him by other members of the Elite Four. If this were Pokémon Red, Blue, or Yellow, Ash’s abysmal battle record wouldn’t have gotten him past Pewter City, let alone to the Indigo League.

Maybe he does better in Johto…