Who is the best woman player all time

.....jean.....

one stroke said:

Recently apparently there was some artical on the 4 best players of all time that left Karen Korr of the list
A friend on FB to notice laughed and said the list starts with Allison and Karen
Mine starts with Jean Balukas and Lori Jon Jones , then Allison after those it gets murky because I don't know what the critera was Kelly Fisher and Ga young Kim are at or near the top of there game and IMHO have a higher gear

Who you got ?

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Allison, then Karen although it appears that Karen is having a longer run

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Was always Jean and Allison. Never a question in my mind.

Of course I have not been paying attention for the last ten years.




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I think Karen Corr beats them all for the dough.

Big Ko might agree with me

Long term success, success against men and women, karen and jean would be at the top of my list

ribdoner said:

Allison, then Karen although it appears that Karen is having a longer run

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Karen has a longer run? She plays in local regional stuff. Allison still travels abroad . Plays in all the tournaments and is a threat and places.

Best Woman Player Ever

Jean. I asked a top ranked woman player who has played against both Jean and Allison and she said Jean was the better player. I watched Jean play one time and she played as good as most of all of the men and had the ability to beat any of them in a race to 11. You have to remember that when she started beating some of the best men players in the world so they went from the Professional Billiard Association (PBA) to the Mens Professional Billiard Association (MPBA) for the sole purpose to keep her out of their tournaments.

One of the biggest reasons why some of the best women back then couldn't beat the men (excluding Jean) was because they couldn't break as hard as the men and the stroke had to be much stronger on slow tables. Jean had the power stroke and a pretty good break and as they said back then "she played like a man". Jean also won (as I recall) 13 tournaments in a row before she refused to pay a fine her peers put on her and she quit. Today with fast cloth and magic racks the game has become easier so today's players look better. Please note that I am not saying the best players today couldn't compete with the best players back then because they could. There is also a lot more great players today than back then.

The problem with Jean is that she didn't stay in the arena long enough. She had a better run than anyone, but the great ones have longer careers.

one stroke said:

Might want to ask Kieth McCreedy who got beat 11-3 by Jean

I'll take Kelly Fisher 10 ball race to 100 and give 20 on the wire against Karen or Allison Kelly has a power break and game niether of them could fade


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I am probably a bit biased here....and it could never be a prop bet because I'm judging
on their best games in their prime.
I am impressed by what Karen did on the Joss tour,,,has any other woman won an open
tournament of that caliber?....and she has a lot of scalps over many Josses.

Lori Shampo had a window where she might have got them all...small window, though.

Easy.. Jean

BRussell said:

The problem with Jean is that she didn't stay in the arena long enough. She had a better run than anyone, but the great ones have longer careers.

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I don't think you have to play for a long time in order to be one of the greatest players of all time, and of course it's not like Jean's game declined, she simply chose to quit.

I think being a great player is more about how well you play, not how long you play. Harold Worst had a short career but is universally recognized as one of the greatest players of all time, and rightly so.

Unless we're talking straight pool, the best ever was Allison Fisher. Her WPBA title count, which is about 50 or so, is incredible and she competed against much tougher fields than Jean Balukas ever faced. Allison also won major 9-ball titles all over the world.

Jean was the best all-around player ever, but Allison Fisher is hands down the best ever woman's nine baller, and Karen Corr is just as clearly second best.

Players like Ewa Laurence, Robin Dodson, Lori Jon Jones and Jeanette Lee, all fine players and deserving BCA Hall of Famers, are not even in the conversation.

The fourth best woman player ever was Ruth McGinnis, who owned a high run of over 130 in the days of the ten footer and had the fullest respect of Ralph Greenleaf.

sjm said:

Unless we're talking straight pool, the best ever was Allison Fisher. Her WPBA title count, which is about 50 or so, is incredible and she competed against much tougher fields than Jean Balukas ever faced.

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Jean actually faced tougher competition than Allison, because Jean competed in the men's tournaments.

Nice thread, I had only head about Jean but never saw her play. I found some matches on youtube and I agree she was quite good!

I think Jasmin has what it takes to be the next one though.

sjm said:

Unless we're talking straight pool, the best ever was Allison Fisher. Her WPBA title count, which is about 50 or so, is incredible and she competed against much tougher fields than Jean Balukas ever faced. Allison also won major 9-ball titles all over the world.

Jean was the best all-around player ever, but Allison Fisher is hands down the best ever woman's nine baller, and Karen Corr is just as clearly second best.

Players like Ewa Laurence, Robin Dodson, Lori Jon Jones and Jeanette Lee, all fine players and deserving BCA Hall of Famers, are not even in the conversation.

The fourth best woman player ever was Ruth McGinnis, who owned a high run of over 130 in the days of the ten footer and had the fullest respect of Ralph Greenleaf.

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No offense but Jean is far ahead the better player compared to Allison. The proof has nothing to do with titles but actual competition where Jean was a threat & did beat a number of strong men players where they had to rally against her playing in the event.

Never in Allison's dominant reign in women's pool did she ever put fear into the hearts of top men players to the point they would not want to play in an event with her.

This right there ends the debate as Jean was truly one of a kind for women pool players.

From what I've read over these many years, I will put Jean Balukas at the Top.

sjm said:

Her WPBA title count, which is about 50 or so, is incredible and she competed against much tougher fields than Jean Balukas ever faced.

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TBPH not including names like Liu Hsin-Mei and Liu Shasha is wrong. Allison might have played tougher women's fields than Jean but she did "not" dominate women's fields like we are seeing today with the rise of the Asian Women in pool.

Keep in mind, since 2002 only one single non-Asian woman has managed to win the World 9-ball championships, Kelly Fisher in 2012. The other 11 of those 12 years were won by Asian women either from China, Taiwan, or Korea.

Allison as good as she was would have had a far tougher time winning events if she had the modern era of top world class women from Asia to compete with. That is evident by the fact that she basically stopped winning world championships the instant the Asian Women's pool scene took off.

That said, there are women who have managed to win multiple World 9-ball championships since the rise of the Asian dominance in the women's world 9-ball scene, just not Allison.

If you are going to compare eras I think you need to look to the modern women who are dominant in the sport today, because when the women's pool scene went global and the Asian's came in force it got WAY tougher then either Jean OR Allison had to deal with when they were winning.

Mike Dechaine?