The original Dragon-type, Dragonite is one of Pokémon’s oldest and most iconic creatures. The lore surrounding Dragonite in both the games and the anime has always been that it's extremely rare and supremely powerful, but Journeys' Masters Eight Tournament has made the famous pseudo-legendary into a big yellow punching bag with wings. The number of dragon-shaped craters on the battlefield is increasing by the episode as one Dragonite after another finds itself on the wrong end of a beatdown that belies the power of what’s supposed to be one of the strongest Pokémon around. So many Dragonite are hitting the dirt in increasingly embarrassing ways that it begs the question: why does Pokémon hate Dragonite so much?
Despite its rarity in the wild, Dragonite is a common sight in the Masters Eight, as three of the eight competitors own one -- Ash, Lance and Iris. Pokémon’s iconic swirly eyes have also become a common sight on the faces of said Dragonite, as Lance’s was blown away by Diantha’s Gardevoir and Iris’s is still in concussion protocols after getting clobbered by Cynthia’s Milotic. Even the trailer for Ash’s upcoming battle with Cynthia has shown that his Dragonite will experience a short, futile battle. For one of the strongest non-legendary Pokémon, the collective record of the three Dragonite in the first round was 1-2 after Lance’s Dragonite beat Diantha’s Aurorus but lost to her Gardevoir, while Iris’s Dragonite instantly lost to Milotic, and Ash didn’t even use his against Steven.
One Dragonite struggling could be taken in stride, two of them getting their wings clipped is pushing it, but three of them getting dusted more often than they beat their opponents is just bananas. The peril of being a powerful Pokémon in the anime is that the series can and will use them as cannon fodder to make weaker Pokémon look stronger -- like, say, a Pikachu defeating a Mega Metagross. The downside is that the stronger Pokémon is, well, stronger, and it can sometimes be distractingly devoid of logic to see something as powerful as a Dragonite get easily defeated by a Water-type using Iron Head, even if Cynthia’s Milotic did crack Iris’s Dragonite right in the temple.
At least Dragonite gets more respect in the games, right? Wrong. The Pokémon main series games ignore Dragonite like Ash ignores his Pokémon at Oak’s Lab. Seldom do any games not set in Kanto or Johto feature a trainer using a Dragonite. Since the introduction of battle gimmicks, dozens of Kanto Pokémon have received Mega Evolutions, signature Z-Moves, Regional Variants or Gigantamax forms -- but not Dragonite. The original Dragon-type is untouched from the day it was created, while even Meowth has two Regional Variants and a Gigantamax form. It’s not like the games ignore all pseudo-legendaries either, as Tyranitar, Metagross, Salamence and Garchomp all have Mega Evolutions, Goodra has a Regional Variant and Kommo-o has a signature Z-Move.
Ash’s Dragonite is catching the worst of this new trend, as it’s currently on a two-battle losing streak after being defeated by Raihan’s Flygon and Paul’s Garchomp. The trailer for Ash’s battle with Cynthia showed a shot of the scoreboard that contained a grayed-out Dragonite, meaning it had already been defeated, so its losing streak is going to continue. It wasn’t always like this, as Ash’s Dragonite previously defeated Korrina’s Mega Lucario and Iris’s Haxorus in the World Coronation Series. Lance’s Dragonite hasn’t had much screen time outside the Masters Eight, and Iris’s Dragonite has lost almost every battle it's ever had since it started obeying her, including a gross loss to Ash’s Dracovish where it was half-swallowed and frozen with Ice Fang.
Dragonite is getting flat-out bullied by Pokémon -- the games ignore it while the anime has made its sole purpose to be defeated and show the opponent’s strength to make the hero’s victory more impressive. Lance and Iris have already been eliminated from the Masters Eight and Ash has only a Finals matchup against Leon for his Dragonite to redeem itself and its species, given its pre-confirmed loss to Cynthia’s Spiritomb. Considering that once the World Coronation Series ends, Ash will probably leave Dragonite at Oak’s or Cerise’s Lab to start a new journey, the clock is ticking for Dragonite to prove it can be more than just Pokémon's Vegeta, existing only to be harshly defeated.