Take a look, it shows the ebb and flow of all players ranked in the top 10 over time. It starts in the 1974-5 season, the first official “pro” tour season, and leverages results at the DP/Leach Nationals for the first few seasons to determine the top 10. In 1981-82, we had a points race for the top 10 for the first time, and have had it ever since.

Here’s a fun fact: in the entire history of the pro tour, now covering more than 50 years … there’s only been a grand total of 94 distinct players who have finished in the top 10 in a given season on tour.

Quick data caveats, since, well, this is Racquetball and no good deed goes published on the internet without someone complaining about it:

– These are End of Season top 10 lists. If you are a player who was ranked in the top 10 for a few weeks in a season 20 years ago and don’t see your name … don’t @ to tell me the data is wrong. Nobody captured mid-season top 10 data and I have no way of showing anything other than season ending top 10 ranks.

– In the first few years of the tours, basically there wasn’t a rolling ranking. The champions were determined by who won the season-ending Nationals event. That’s why the first few years look weird; I just took the Nationals finish and kind of jury-rigged a top 10.

Some fun facts:

– in 2019, there had only been 79 distinct players in the history of Pro racquetball to finish in the top 10 in any season. That number has now risen to 94 through this season, as we’ve had a ton of new faces make top 10 debuts in the last 5-6 years. Moscoso, Acuna, Jake, Montoya, Natera, Portillo, Adam Manilla, Carter, Martell, Trujillo? All new within the last few years, along with a slew of others.

– Same info for the Women: in 2019 there had been 97 women who had a top10 finish … now that number is up to 106. We haven’t really had that many new women debut that high in the last half decade. Gaby, Laime, Erika Manilla, Barrios, Centellas, and this year Lotts is in the top 10.