I’d add Sebastian Brock, he created the alternative freestyle division
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Hey guys…, it has been brought to my attention that I misspelled “Brett Grimes” name in my post earlier on this thread!
I was joking about the year 2009 being empty?
Why?
Anyway I apologize for my grammatical mistakes!
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Yeah yeah. I was in no way implying that Ann can’t yoyo. I do love Ann’s yoyoing. I just observe that every time she jumps into relevancy in the community it comes from her being a personality more than the content of her yoyoing (by attending contests or creating content in her youtube channel). I think she fullfills the same role in the community as Graeme Steller, while he’s a great yoyo player, he shines in the community as an MC more than a straight up yoyoer.
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Added a couple more. If you guys have suggestions let me know.
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Barney Akers, Bob Rule, Dale Oliver, Dale Myrberg, Dave Schulte, Dennis McBride, Tom Kuhn, Dave Hall, Eric Wolff, Brad Countryman, Jack Russell, Don Duncan, Lucky Meisenheimer… the list goes on and on
Edit: John Higby
Tommy Smothers
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Ken from Ken’s World on a string. For a long time that’s all there was.
KWOS still exists btw.
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Adam Bottiglia. Although his influence on the the evolution of competition in modern yoyoing is lesser then a lot of the people on this list, his site has probably helped guide thousands of new players onto the right path and his tutorials have done the same. I’m not sure if he is quite on the level of Andre for total influence, but the success of his business model shows in how many contests they have been able to sponsor.
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Wow … I think the oldest guy on the list is Steve. What about Gus Somera, Barney Akers, Bob Rule, Pedro Flores, Tom Radovan. And dozens more. You all need to take a history class. Or at least watch a few history videos. All fixed axle players from the golden age. Before the decline …
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Dazzling Dave Schulte for sure.
There are many people who pushed the activity forward. It is a communal effort, hard to “rank” influences.
Of course those who posted videos and materials on the web got the most exposure.
Not sure of everyone who should be on a list. I am sure I wouldn’t 
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Added a couple more.
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I’ll read more of the thread later, I only briefly skimmed through a large list towards the beginning. Anyway, Tom Kuhn is my nomination. He’s my John Stockton lol. Maybe not a figure most youth today know or care about much? When I was about 10-12 yo, I got the Silver Bullet II as a gift, and at the time it was supposedly a new type concept (aluminum, ball bearing, adjustable gap, friction pads, weight rings etc), 200$ yoyo at the time. Of course non of that meant anything much to me back then, but am I over estimating the importance of the “first aluminum ball bearing” yoyo that was taken to orbit? Tom Kuhn I’ve heard was the “father of yoyos”.
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Added one more player.
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Yu Kawada should be mentioned here. His unique styling of yoyoing freestyle in worlds 1a divisions ended up leading to the creation of the Artistic Performance Division at worlds today. The idea of judging a freestyle for it’s performance aspect rather than technical and for how artistically it is presented with a theme is huge.
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Tommy (Kyle Ngyun sp?) Gunn from Extremspin.
Here is a poll, but the result is very much a player of influence.https://www.weshop.com/our-picks/Keep-On-Voting-The-Five-Most-Underrated-YoYo-Players-Up-To-Now-908.html?ss=forum02
I didn’t see Jon Gates listed… Pretty sure i read he figured out the bind for 4A, but i may be mistaken.
Tom Smothers
Doc Pop
Ed Haponik
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