Monica Seles

Monica Seles redefined women's tennis with her two-handed groundstrokes, winning 9 Grand Slam singles titles before a tragic stabbing in Hamburg in April 1993 halted her dominance. At her peak, she won 8 of the 11 Grand Slams she entered between 1990 and 1993 and held the world number one ranking for 178 weeks, a period where she outperformed #2 Martina Navratilova in head-to-head matches by a 60% win rate. Seles was the youngest player to reach number one at age 16 in 1990, faster than the typical rival by three years, and her 1992 French Open final victory over Steffi Graf featured 45 winners, under 5% fewer than her opponent's total. Despite returning to win the 1996 Australian Open—her only Grand Slam after the attack—she never reclaimed her pre-1993 form, which included 3 consecutive Wimbledon finals.