Paula Badosa

Paula Badosa was born in Manhattan to Spanish parents who worked in fashion, and the family's move to Barcelona when she was seven is where the tennis began. A junior Roland-Garros title in 2015 hung the next-Sharapova tag on a 17-year-old, and she has spoken openly about the depression that weight fed before the results arrived. She still lives and trains in Barcelona.

Her game is first-strike from a 1.80-meter frame: the serve is her self-described favorite shot, backed by career rates of 69 percent on first-serve points and a 70 percent hold on record. The forehand is heavy, and she moves well for her height. Quick hard courts reward that mix, so it tracks that The Drop Shot's skill model grades her hard-court level nearly 120 points above her clay — an inversion for a Barcelona product.

The 2024-25 hard-court swings shaped the career: a US Open quarterfinal in 2024, semifinals at the China Open and Cincinnati, then her best Slam finish at the Australian Open, a semifinal run opened up by a 7-5, 6-4 quarterfinal win over Coco Gauff, then WTA No. 3. That surge lifted her to a career-high WTA No. 9 by March 2025. Gauff doubles as the defining rival, and Badosa leads their meetings on record 3-2 with a win on each surface.

What the résumé still lacks is a trophy: zero tour-level titles on record, a count July 2026's Iași Open final left unmoved when a four-win week ended against Mayar Sherif. As of July 2026 the Spaniard sits at WTA No. 93, 83 places below a year earlier, on a 12-15 season. The last ten argue the rebuild has legs, though, at 6-4 with a 1-6, 6-3, 6-2 win over then-top-10 Gauff at June's Berlin Open.