How is this Blaziken outspeeding my Garchomp?

Oct. 20, 2022

In thisreplay, I managed to paralyze a greedy Blaziken. According to the calculator, a jolly Blaziken that is paralyzed and with two speed boosts is supposed to have a speed stat of 284 or basically the value before it gets any speed boosts while a jolly Garchomp is supposed to have a speed stat of 333. Yet in that replay on turn ten, Blaziken was supposed to have gone first but got paralysis even though Garchomp should be faster. Why is that? Is the calcs wrong or is this a showdown bug?

Pleaselog inorregisterto add a comment.

(The explanation to this was discussed in the comments, however I thought I’d add in an answer anyways to make things easier to read for anyone else who finds this question.)

As the Blaziken was holding a Life Orb instead of a speed-boosting item, the only possible explanation to this scenario is that the Blaziken used a priority move, likely protect, as unusual as that seems. Several people (myself included, I’m not amazing at comp) will sometimes wind up using off meta sets that are otherwise sub-par, and this person is likely no exception.