These are women I have seen play. In person. That leaves out just about everyone from pre-1980. But includes most of the great players, aside from Margaret Court, Helen Wills Moody and Billie Jean King. I believe those three would have been competitive in any age, though the women’s game in the pre-Open era was a sort of clubby, upper-middle-class sport — as opposed to the far more egalitarian sport of the past 30 years.

The prompt for this is Serena Williams winning the women’s championship at Wimbledon today. Plus, the internet seems extraordinarily dead and boring today, and lists usually perk up people. Just trying to help.

10. Hana Mandlikova. How good would she have been if she were the only Czech player of her generation? Won four slams in a highly competitive era. Tall, rangy, good skill set.  Didn’t win at Wimbledon. I can still picture her on the court, wearing that handband.

9. Tracy Austin. The all-time child prodigy. Won the U.S. Open at age 16 in 1980 (the first of her two slam titles). The smallest player on this list, at 5-5, 120 pounds. Tremendous athleticism, extremely heady, precocious to the nth degree. Defeated both Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova in the same tournament (Canada, 1980) when players were lucky to beat either one once in a year. But her rapid,  injury-driven burnout led to a debate about letting female players train too hard when they were too young. She was basically done by age 21.

8. Martina Hingis. I really liked watching her play, so maybe she’s ranked a bit high. But she did win 5 slam events, at least one at each of the four except for the French (which seems odd, because she was so quick and accurate). Supremely athletic, great energy, always in shape, massively competitive — and she needed all that because she was the smallest elite player of her age (5-7, 130), aside from Justine Henin (whose best tennis came after Hingis was gone). Seemed to hurt herself a lot, maybe because she played so hard, and was all but done by age 22 in 2002. Made a comeback in 2006, failed a test for cocaine in 2007 (she denies using the drug) and retired when she was handed a two-year ban in early 2008. Still spent 209 weeks as world No. 1.

7. Justine Henin. Plucky little Belgian shotmaker with the great one-hand backhand, won seven slams (though never Wimbledon). Probably as good as she could possibly be, perhaps as driven as anyone (and that covers a lot of territory), but the strain of being at the top seemed to burn her out, mentally, faster than just about anyone else. Quit while ranked No. 1 in the world, in May of last year, at the age of 25. And not because she was hurt.

6. Venus Williams. How huge would her career have been if she didn’t have a sister? No one as tall as she is (6-foot-1) has been as athletic. Hits the ball a ton. Great range, great court coverage. Seven slams, though none at the Australian or the French.

5. Monica Seles. It’s a bit easy to forget how good she was. Nine grand slam championships despite sharing most of an era with Steffi Graf. Plus, she was stabbed in the back (yes, stabbed) during a match in Germany in 1993, and didn’t play for more than two years when she was 1) in her prime and 2) had compiled a 3-1 record in slam finals against Graf. She won only one slam event (the 1996 Australian) after the stabbing. Big (5-10, 150), fluid, sometimes remembered negatively for her infamous grunt but better recalled as a relentlessly nice woman who happened to be a great tennis player.

4. Serena Williams. That’s 11 slams now, and she is getting into rarefied air, with only six players above her. Has any woman ever hit the ball harder? I doubt it. Just killer pace but with good court-coverage and significant athleticism. Not as consistently good as the three I have ranked ahead of her; she seems to point for (and play really hard) only in the slams. It also is fair to wonder whether she would have done better if she didn’t carry around as much weight as she has, especially the last few years. Might have lost a few mph on the serve, but the gain in speed and agility might have been worth it.

3. Chris Evert. The last of the elegant-but-still-great female players. Won 18 slam events, seven at Roland Garros. A great shotmaker, a pleasure to watch, and if she didn’t invent the two-handed backhand, she certainly popularized it. She might have won more slams than anyone had not the era of the uber-conditioned female player broken out in the middle of her career.  She couldn’t quite match the size and strength of the players who stampeded into the sport beginning around 1980 (unless she was playing on clay). At 5-6, 130 pounds, she would be considered tiny in today’s tennis.

2. Steffi Graf. Could make a case for her as No. 1, absolutely.  She won more slams (22) than anyone in tennis history, aside from Margaret Court, whose 24 include 11 in Australia. Graf was No. 1 for 377 weeks,  a record for men or women, and ended the year ranked No. 1 eight times, also unmatched by any player. That monster forehand. Athletic. Covered the court as well as anyone. And had a long run among the elite, from about 1987 till she retired, in 1999, still ranked No. 3 in the world.

1. Martina Navritilova. Yep. The best. Practically unbeatable for long stretches of time. Like in 1983, when she went 86-1 and won three slams. She was a revolutionary figure because she really kicked off the Age of the Amazon in women’s tennis. At 5-8, she wasn’t as tall as many of the elite players now, but for her time she was a beast who just overpowered the opposition. Most of her opponents were beaten before Martina even got on the court; she was that scary. Nobody could match her pace. Well, not until Graf came along, anyway. After Martina, everyone had to be in tiptop, veins-popping-from-her-forearms shape. Not just tennis shape. Still holds records for most singles titles won (167), male or female. And that’s the other thing about her: She was really, really good for a very, very long time. From 1978-90, at the least. Nobody has that sort of longevity anymore.