Welcome to the third installment of men’s singles power rankings in 2024.
These rankings are a subjective view of the entire pro field. Here are some of the factors taken into consideration:
- Recent finishes (specifically the last three months)
- PPA Points
- APP Points
- Head-to-head competition
- Number of events played
- MLP Dreambreaker performance
To show you how good the top 20 men are, there have been 18 events across all pro tours this year, with 54 medals being handed out. These top 20 athletes account for 50 of those 54 medals.
20. Hayden Patriquin (Previously Not Ranked) - Patriquin is back in our rankings with a couple of quarterfinal finishes in recent tournaments. He got a sixth-place finish in PPA LA and 8th in PPA Red Rock. Big H got a big win in LA over Ben Johns. He followed that up with a win over Connor Garnett in Utah. Hayden has the ability to beat anyone at any time, but he is inconsistent from match to match.
Erik Tice
19. Collin Shick (19) - Shick is ridiculously athletic and covers the entire court as well as anybody. Unfortunately for him, Shick only has two quarterfinal finishes this year. Shick has three bad finishes on the year, with his worst coming this past weekend at the PPA Texas Open. Collin has lost to Quang Duong and Federico Staksrud. I think he is going to make a semifinal run within the next month or so. In addition, Shick handled first-player duties in Dreambreakers for the Bay Area Breakers, winning 59 percent of his points against other teams' top players.
18. Gabriel Joseph (16) - Talk about consistency. Has Joseph won a tournament since last year in So Cal? No. But, here's a crazy stat - in the first nine tournaments that Gabe played in 2024, he made it to the Round of 16 in all of them. He hasn't had the breakout tournament this year like last year, but he puts in the work and it should come again sometime soon. Joseph very well could be the fastest and quickest athlete in pro pickleball.
17. Pablo Tellez (15) - Tellez' best performance this year was at the PPA Indoor Championships, beating Anton Gudz and Julian Arnold. Pablo can be a very streaky player – he lost two tournaments in a row in the Round of 32 and then followed that up with an 11th, 8th, and 14th-place finish most recently in Texas. When Pablo gets hot he can easily make the semifinals, which I expect to see a couple of more times this year.
16. Yates Johnson (NR) - This is the first time for Yates in our power rankings and that's probably my fault rather than his. He had a slow start to the 2024 year, only playing APP events. He earned a bronze medal in the first APP Tour event in Punta Gorda. Since signing exclusively with the PPA, he has played in six tournaments and making the quarterfinals twice, with his worst finish being 11th. All of that while being seeded incorrectly and having to play through some really good PPA players – I expect him to get his seeding into the low teens within a couple of months.
15. Hunter Johnson (12) - Hunter had a little more success on the APP Tour than Yates early in 2024. He won APP Miami and came in second at Punta Gorda. He hasn't had as much success as Yates on the PPA Tour, again due to his extremely high seeding. His best finish was this past weekend at the Texas Open, where he finished seventh.
14. Will Howells (11) - Howells doesn't play as many tournaments as the rest of the field - he has only played five tournaments in singles. Will is one of the most athletic players on tour and has great ground strokes from both sides, preferring his twoey on serve returns. He won APP Sacramento and got third at APP Delray Beach. In his only singles tournament on the PPA Tour, he got 11th at Desert Ridge.
Erik Tice
Howells is also on the New Jersey 5s in MLP and took much of the first-player duties in their three Dreambreakers, going up against Jack Sock, Hunter Johnson, and Dylan Frazier, and finishing 17-15 against three guys who are also on this list. He even went 4-0 in one round of Dreambreaker with Sock and was able to win the final point to beat the Hustlers.
13. Jack Foster (17) - The University of Florida student plays exclusively on the APP Tour and is part of the APP Next Gen National Team. Foster has four medals this year – two bronzes, a silver at APP Sacramento, and he got his first pro win at the US Open Championships. Foster is young, lengthy, and athletic. If he can find a little more consistency in his APP Tour events, the sky is the limit.
12. Tyson McGuffin (10) - McGuffin is the highest-seeded player in our power rankings with zero medals this year. McGuffin has had a tough year in singles – he had a plantar fascia issue that sidelined him for a month or so and he has gotten a little unlucky with draws. In Dallas he lost to Dusty Boyer, an EXTREMELY good singles player, but he was a No. 36 seed. In LA, he lost to Roscoe Bellamy in the Round of 16, but Bellamy is way better than his No. 23 seed. McGuffin has three fourth-place finishes this year – so close to a medal. He is one of the hardest workers on tour and is much better than where we have him in our rankings - he just doesn't have the results in 2024 to prove it. YET.
11. Quang Duong (14) - Quang is an elite mover with some of the best passing shots in all of pickleball. Also, if you know of anyone who trains harder than him, please let me know. Duong won a silver medal in Houston and just feels destined to win a tournament sometime this year. He got knocked out of the Texas Open this past weekend by Hunter Johnson (the No. 33 seed) in the Round of 32 – his next-worst finish this year on the PPA Tour was 13th. He is consistently making quarterfinals or better on tour, to the tune of 5-of-10 tournaments making the quarters or better.
10. Grayson Goldin (18) - The former USF Bull does NOT miss workout days, and it shows. He is also a showman, playing to the crowd and building drama. Goldin plays mostly on the APP Tour and won APP Cincinnati, got silver at APP Miami and most recently at APP NYC. He had a bad outing at PPA Red Rock, but followed that up on the PPA Tour in Texas, with a ninth-place finish as the No. 54 seed (he had to go through qualifiers), beating Aanik Lohani (11), Jonny Pickleball (43), and barely losing to Hunter Johnson in the third game, 8-11. Goldin is the real deal and should continue pushing for podium finishes for the foreseeable future.
9. JW Johnson (9) - JW doesn't play nearly as much singles as the rest of the guys in the top 10. He hasn't had a win since Nationals last November. Before signing an exclusive PPA Tour contract, JW came in second at APP Delray Beach and third at the US Open, losing to Jack Foster and Hunter Johnson. JW may fall out of the top 10 if he continues to skip tournaments and finish outside the quarterfinals, which he has done for the last three events.
8. Jaume Martinez Vich (8) - I think anyone who plays against Jaume would agree he is one of the 10 best singles players right now. Jaume got a silver medal in Desert Ridge and a bronze in Houston. The reason he is not higher is because he is inconsistent. Here are the results of his last four events: 7th, 29th, 10th, 32nd. In those two bad finishes, JMV lost to Yates Johnson and a nailbiter against Rio Newcombe, losing 11-13 in the third. If he can get some more consistent semifinal runs, the Spaniard has all the talent in the world to move up the rankings. Lastly, JMV won 65 percent of his four Dreambreaker matches in singles, giving him the best singles win percentage as the top guy at the Challenger Level.
7. Jack Sock (7) - Sock has two medals on the PPA Tour this year. He earned a bronze at the first event, The Masters, and came up JUST short in Red Rock, losing to Fed in the finals for a silver medal. He also had three quarterfinal appearances earlier this year, with two out of three of those being wins. Sock doesn't play as many tournaments as some of the other players high up on this list. He is easily one of the top-five entertainers on tour and has ALL the shots - I definitely think he will pull out a win in 2024.
6. Dylan Frazier (6) - Dylan is the highest-ranked player with only one medal on tour this year. The Mizzou Tiger won the first event of the season at The Masters, but results have been sporadic since then. In his next seven tournaments, Dylan made the quarterfinals five times. The other two times? He lost in the Round of 32 to Noe Khlif and in the Round of 16 to upstart Cason Campbell. Frazier has finished 5th and 4th in the last two tournaments he's played and has some positive momentum going into PPA Sacramento.
5. Connor Garnett (4) - Garnett got his first gold medal at the PPA LA Open in April, beating Rafa Hewett, Jaume Martinez Vich, Aanik Lohani, and Federico Staksrud in the final. Connor also has three other medals on the year, all earlier in the year - two bronze and a silver at the Indoor Championships. Garnett is one of the most consistent players in singles this year - during his last 10 events, his worst finish was 13th. He made the quarterfinals or better in seven of the 10 tournaments. Garnett is an elite mover and has one of the best twoeys (two handed backhand) in the game, so much so that he is trying to patent the term.
Jason Flamm
4. Christian Alshon (3) - Other than Staksrud, Alshon is the most consistent man in men's singles this year. Christian has played nine tournaments in singles, and has always finished between 3rd and 7th place - never having a bad tournament. Alshon is one of the most athletic players on tour and even though he has a bigger frame than some of the others, he has elite quickness. Alshon has three bronze medals this year and it's only a matter of time before he gets his first tournament win.
3. Chris Haworth (5) - Haworth is the top-ranked player who plays both the APP and PPA Tours. The former Oklahoma State Cowboy has three tournament wins this year on the APP Tour - Punta Gorda, Delray Beach, and NYC. Haworth also got a bronze medal at APP Sacramento and a silver at the US Open. Last weekend at the Texas Open is where he really made a bigger splash in pickleball on the PPA Tour. Haworth beat Noe Khlif, Roscoe Bellamy, Dusty Boyer, Hunter Johnson, and Federico Staksrud on his way to a silver medal. Haworth has all the shots and moves very well.
2. Ben Johns (1) - Ben has five gold medals this year, most recently winning the PPA Atlanta Slam and Texas Open in back-to-back events. In four of those wins, he beat Fed in the finals, so how could he possibly be ranked behind him? The other four times that Ben did not win, he missed the semifinals each time. Ben is obviously an extremely good singles player, but his consistency has fallen off a little bit this year. I don't think it has anything to do with his level of play, but more to do with the field getting increasingly better.
1. Federico Staksrud (2) - Eleven medals in 11 tries. Fed Staksrud is the most consistent player in the game right now. Staksrud has played 60 matches in singles this year, winning 53 of them (88 percent). In those matches, he has played 117 games, winning 95 of them, for a 81 percent win percentage. Fed is No. 1 in our power rankings due to his consistency, but if he can put together a couple of wins over Ben Johns by the end of the year, he will start pulling ahead even more.
