So not too long ago I asked the community about my first trophy card between two trophies in the early 2000’s and the Mysterious Pearl wins ! A lot of you made some valid points and as I keep looking at this card is just looks great to me :
My question is … do we in the community have any insight of the possible number of copies out there ? Pokumon says there’s 81 copies ( obviously not correct ) and I have read some people saying there is less than 200 , then less than 500 , and even less than 1200 , so I wonder if anyone has better insight on the possibly printed copies
I know population shouldn’t really matter with PSA but less than 50 psa 9 and 10’s of this card seems pretty possible that this card was less than 300-400 printed ?
Any who thanks for reading and look forward too seeing your comments y’all 
7 Likes
Firstly, congratulations on deciding on the Mysterious Pearl. It is a very beautiful card.
The number of 81 is only at the Battle Road Spring 2007 event. The Pearl was also handed out as an Excellence Award prize card at the Winter Challenge 2007 event.
Why is it hard to determine the exact number?
Winter Challenge 2007 took place between November 25, 2007 (Sun) - January 20, 2008 (Sun) and was held at 8 locations for 11 days in total. It was a free for all entry. No pre-requisites for qualification for the event, no lottery system if there were too many people etc. It was a first come-first serve basis. Meaning as long as you stand in line to enter the event before the cutoff deadline you can participate. The event took place between 9:00AM to 17:00PM and the cut-off deadline was 16:30PM.
To qualify for this excellence prize (Mysterious Pearl) you had to collect 7 point in total within the same age category. If you win 2 consecutive games you get 3 points. So you have to win 6 games (3x 2 consecutive sets) to be able to accumulate 7 point and be awarded the card.
So, I don’t know how many actual people participated and how large was each venue, but as long as you accumulated 7 points, you got the card. Even if you lost one of the battles, all you have to do is stand in line again, get entry into the event before the cut-off time and participate again.
Even if we are conservative in guessing that everyday 10 cards were handed out each age group for each day, that put the total at:
3 age divisions x10 cards x 11 days = 330 Mysterious Pearls + 81 (Battle Road) = 411 Cards.
This is just me taking what I feel is a very conservative number. The bigger age divisions are super optimized and figure out the meta very quick. I have read blogs from players on how they would make groups as friends to try and get hold of maximum of these prize cards as possible. Meaning that one player can also win multiple copies. 400 - 450 copies should be a minimum (in my personal opinion).
I hope this provides a rough breakdown and puts your mind at ease. To be also honest, the card holds its value regardless of the number distributed. It is a great card and with a lot of history.
Cheers!
6 Likes
Thank you ! With all that info I think it’s safe too say 500 and under possibly are floating around but seeing that PSA has graded under 130 of these and Beckett / CGC has even lower numbers I believe … maybe some were lost for ever down the road or just thrown away ? Who knows but I always wonder if there was a majority of the pearls just lost or thrown out 
I feel honoured being part of the 44 peeps like you in the world with this card and grade 
Well not every card has to be graded. A low pop of graded cards can also mean that most cards are just sitting in binders or away in collections which are not been graded.
Cheers!
