Some interesting observations in this chart:
– 106 women have appeared in a top 10 since 1975. This is a bit more than the men; we see a lot of players who reached the top 10 for short periods of time, then dropped off quickly.
– The depth of the tour early on was very thin; the early parts of the graphic may look odd as it shows the early legends of the sport like Peggy Stedding and Jean Saucer lingering at the bottom of the bar chart before the tour begins to fill out.
– I think its amazing how many players debuted at #2 or #1 on tour; Heather McKay finished #1 in her first pro season, won four titles in five years, then basically disappeared. Lynn Adams debuted at #2 her first full season touring, as did Michelle Gould. Marci Drexler, who may be the most underrated player in the tour’s history, debuted at #3 in 1986 … then retired at #3 13 years later.
– Also interesting how so many players retired at or near the top. Gould ran off seven straight #1 titles … then never played again. Shannon Wright played seven events in 1983-84 season, made the semis in all of them … then quit and never played another pro event. In this graphic you’ll see these players’ bar charts just plummet off the screen, showing their ranking diving from a top 4 level to non-existent.

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.