In darts, there are only ever really 10-16 players that you expect to see winning titles with regularity.
Then there are some solid players that you aren’t surprised to see pick up an occasional title, but very rarely would it be a major title.
Throughout the years though, there have also been players that you do expect to see winning titles but for some reason, they don’t seem to win as much as fans think they should.
In this article we are going to look at some of the best darts players who we think SHOULD have won more in darts. It’s not just ‘nearly’ players either, even some of the greats could/should have won more than they did…
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7 Darts Players Who Should Have Won More
Raymond van Barneveld
This sounds like a ridiculous take to start with but hear us out…
Raymond van Barneveld is one of the greatest darts players of all time. A 5 time world champion (4 x BDO, 1 x PDC) and over 30 major titles across the PDC and BDO have him as one of the most successful to ever play the game.
Why is he on this list then?
Many fans feel he didn’t win as much as he should have when he moved to the PDC.
He dominated the BDO winning 14 major finals out of 17 and when he moved over to the PDC he won the world championship in his first attempt, dethroning the rampant Phil Taylor.
The expectation was so high as he’d also won back to back UK Open championships. Following early success though, he would then only win a single ranked major in close to two decades in the PDC after.
He still has one of the best careers of any player but there’s a feeling it could have been even better.
Tony O’Shea
Like Martin Adams, Silverback spent the majority of his career playing in the BDO and is probably one of the organisation’s best ever players.
His prime years came between 2002 – 2013 where he went to several BDO major finals and dozens of quarter/semi-finals, however, he was never able to lift one of the major titles.
He’s a three time world championship runner-up and is often considered to be the ‘nearly man’ of the BDO. You have to be a great player to make it to those finals but eventually it’s seen as a negative when you can’t get over that final hurdle.
O’Shea was a fan favourite and top player but he should have won more when you look at the countless deep tournament runs that he made!
Ronnie Baxter
Like a few others on this list, Ronnie Baxter is often considered to be one of the best players never to win a major tv title.
Baxter was a back-to-back runner-up in the BDO World Championship and with a professional career spanning more than a decade, he was a regular face in the latter stages of PDC major tournaments.
Dozens of semi-final and quarter-final finishes had Baxter consistently ranked within the top 10 on the PDC Order of Merit but despite his consistency as one of the top players in darts, he was never able to claim a major title.
There’s a feeling that a major title could have been a catalyst for Baxter to go on and win more (like a Peter Wright for example) but it was never to be for The Rocket.
Dave Chisnall
This article is made for someone like Chizzy.
BDO World Championship runner-up, 6 x PDC major runner-up, 2 x World Series finals runner-up.
Dave Chisnall has consistently been one of the top performers in darts, yet he’s had to watch players of similar ability lift major titles where he has failed to do so.
A main reason why people expect him to win more is because he has dozens of titles on the ProTour and European Tour.
The European titles are most relevant because he’s winning them in front of large crowds, often with 10,000+ spectators!
For some reason, Chisnall has just not been able to replicate it at the major TV finals.
He believes he will win a major title one day but for now he’s cemented on this list as a player that the majority of fans feel should have won more.
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Adrian Lewis
Similar to Barney, Adrian Lewis is a world champion (x2) so it’s strange to put him on this list, but as one of the most gifted players to ever throw a dart, his prime years were unbelievable – but arguably too short…
When you look at other world champions like Gary Anderson and Peter Wright, they won majors over the span of a decade whereas Lewis was a dominant force mainly between 2011-2014 where he went to 9 major finals.
He recently admitted that he feels he himself should have won more during his career which helped us include him on this list.
He stated that his ‘mindset’ was something that really stopped him reaching his full potential.
Related – Adrian Lewis thinks he should have won more in darts but ‘mindset’ held him back
Jackpot went to 14 major ranking finals yet only won 4 of them. We say ‘only’ because on his day, Lewis was one of the best players to ever throw a dart.
Prime Phil Taylor and Gary Anderson accounted for most of those runner-up finishes which is understandable but for a player of his ability, most would agree that he should have won more in darts despite his accomplishments.
See also – Adrian Lewis shows us how he throws darts [darts masterclass]
Peter Manley
Making it to a World Championship final is no easy task. It’s debatable that with a favourable draw, a lower ranked player could ‘fluke’ it to the final but it’s unlikely.
Peter Manley went to three World Championship finals but never managed to win one.
This probably doesn’t get talked about enough because Manley was a controversial player and one of the most disliked for his personality more than his ability.
Take the character out of the equation and Peter Manley was obviously an elite player. The most baffling statistic is that Manley only made it to five PDC major finals – winning one in the Las Vegas Desert Classic.
We say only because he went to three World Championship finals and a World Matchplay final and he was unfortunate to meet prime Phil Taylor in the all World Championship finals, so, we understand him falling short
to perform like that on the biggest stage of all though, it’s strange that he didn’t win more in other competitions because you’d think he’d have been capable of cleaning up any other major where Taylor was eliminated…
Terry Jenkins
Top of the list has to be Terry Jenkins, probably the unluckiest darts player in history.
You don’t win tournaments based on luck and you don’t make it to many finals based on luck. Terry Jenkins went to an impressive 9 PDC major finals, however, never managed to win one of them.
Jenkins is known for having one of the worst titles in darts which is the darts ‘nearly man’.
To go to that many major finals means that you can’t debate how good Jenkins was as a player. You could say he didn’t have what it took to go all the way but then you should also consider the pliers he lost to in those finals:
- Phil Taylor x 4
- James Wade x 2
- Adrian Lewis
- Raymond van Barneveld
- Michael van Gerwen
These are some of the most successful players in the 2000’s & 2010’s and most are amongst the greatest darts players of all time.
Had Jenkins played in a different era, he may have more titles to his name but for the number of runner-up finishes, he has to be considered as THE player who should have won more in darts, even if it was just a single title!
It’s a hard list for inclusion but some other players we left off were Wayne Mardle, Mike Gregory and Mervyn King.
King in particular would have been on it were it not for his success in the BDO as he wasn’t far off Jenkins when it came to falling short in the PDC.
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