Do we like them?

Do we like Jessica Pegula?

Our score: 7 out of 10. A clean record and real advocacy for women players, but thin on LGBTQ+ and planet questions, so we can't go higher.

Pegula is a Buffalo girl from a wealthy family, and she spent years being written off for it. One piece put it bluntly: plenty of people dismissed her as a rich girl buying her way in. She answered by being a late bloomer who got to the top the hard way, turning up at the top level well after most players do.

The big moment was the 2024 US Open, where she knocked out world No. 1 Iga Swiatek in the quarters and beat Karolina Muchova in the semis. She lost the final to Aryna Sabalenka, becoming the oldest American to reach a first major final. In 2026 she is still knocking on the door, with a US Open semi this September and a win over Sabalenka in Berlin.

Scandals first: there aren't any. We found no court rulings, fines or credible allegations against her, only the usual tabloid-style noise about her wealth and her swearing on court. Nothing there that shows how she treats people, other than that she mostly seems to be liked in the locker room.

On the harm check, it's a clean sheet, with a gap. We found no remarks from her about trans or LGBTQ+ people, migrants or the climate, and no dodgy company or projects. What she has talked about is women's pay: she pointed out that the Slams pay equally but, in her words, it’s “not equal in a lot of the other tournaments.”

She's also been willing to say awkward things in public. In 2023 she said that if the WTA took its Finals to Saudi Arabia, it needed to deliver change for women there, saying “we want to be making a change.” Where you land on that depends on whether you read it as a conditional stand or as an opening for the money. In 2026 the Finals moved to Indian Wells because of the Middle East conflict, and she said the decision had to be accepted.

Lately she has been busy on the politics of the tour. In February she was named to chair the WTA's Tour Architecture Council, set up to untangle the calendar after a run of withdrawals. In June she publicly criticised the four-year doping ban on Marketa Vondrousova as too harsh, while accepting some penalty was due for refusing a test. You can disagree with her on that one, but it was backing a colleague at some cost to her popularity.