With the dust now settled on a thrilling 2024 MotoGP season, who were the best and worst riders of the season?
Simon Patterson takes on the challenge of ranking the performances of all 22 full-time riders across the whole of 2024 from worst to best irrespective of their machinery:
22 Joan Mir
Championship position: 21st
It's not hard to work out 2020 world champion Joan Mir's Honda problem: he tries too hard.
There's certainly no fear in him, but that's perhaps not a good thing as it keeps him pushing hard to do his best, even when the bike isn't there for it. The end result? Crash, after crash, after crash.
There's still obviously a tonne of potential inside Mir but, until Honda builds him a better machine, we're not going to see too much of it.
21 Luca Marini
Championship position: 22nd
In many ways, this past season was textbook Luca Marini.
A slow start, not much in the way of performance, but a steady improvement throughout the season to the point where he was delivering surprisingly strong performances and consistent points by the end of it.
Of course, he still finished last of the full-time riders in the standings, but that's partly a result of the bike he was riding as well as his own slow start. And you've got to think that both a rider more up to speed and a Honda that's better than it was in 2024 will help him to achieve something more next year.
20 Jack Miller
Championship position: 14th
The 2024 season was a disaster for Jack Miller. He's a rider who's proven that he can win races in MotoGP, but there was scant sign of that this year as he struggled more than most to adapt in particular to Michelin's new rear tyre - something that really shouldn't be an issue for a racer with his experience.
He was nowhere near team-mate Brad Binder and a long, long way from KTM's rookie Pedro Acosta. It was a disappointing end to his tenure with the firm, and frankly, he's quite lucky to have retained a MotoGP seat for 2025 in the face of some stiff competition for it.
19 Alex Rins
Championship position: 18th
Firstly, let's address the elephant in the room: Alex Rins is still far from fully fit after his horrific broken leg injury suffered halfway through 2023, and that has absolutely limited his performances in 2024, even as much as he might insist it hasn't.
However, while he's adamant that he's physically fine on the bike, it means that he can only be measured against team-mate Fabio Quartararo - and given the huge disparity in performances between the two of them, there are few ways to spin this season into any sort of positive for the six-time premier class race winner.
18 Taka Nakagami
Championship position: 19th
All in all, 2024 was a relatively standard-issue Taka Nakagami season of being Honda's Japanese representative who picks up points now and then and who can deliver the odd surprise result.
He was hindered by spending much of his season on machinery that was technically inferior to Honda's other three riders, so more could have been achieved with better support, but it's unlikely to have been enough to ensure that he kept his ride for another season rather than losing it to Somkiat Chantra for 2025.
17 Augusto Fernandez
Championship position: 20th
Measured against his fellow KTM riders, Augusto Fernandez didn't have a truly terrible year - but he absolutely didn't have a good one, either.
He was waylaid by both a crew chief who he didn't click with (and who was replaced mid-season) and perhaps more than any of the KTM riders by Michelin's new rear tyre.
His relative lack of MotoGP experience showed and there wasn't much to be positive about all season long. A few decent results here and there were the only silver linings - but it's telling that there were fewer of them this year than in his rookie season.
16 Raul Fernandez
Championship position: 16th
It's hard to consider Raul Fernandez's season as anything other than a pretty significant disappointment. So much so that he's probably lucky he got his two-year Trackhouse deal signed up early.
One brief run at the front in the first Barcelona weekend followed by a year of rather ignominious results can be partly explained both by Aprilia's late-season woes and by the fact that he switched machinery from a 2023 bike to the latest spec halfway through the year - but given what others were achieving on the bike, what Fernandez managed wasn't good enough for most of the season.
15 Johann Zarco
Championship position: 17th
By far Honda's best rider this season, Johann Zarco has more than lived up to expectations with his excellent first season at the team.
He was better than any of its other riders at walking the fine line between extracting enough from the bike to be fast but not asking too much that it inevitably ended up in the gravel.
He delivered some exceptional performances, especially in the latter stages of the season as the bike improved.
The best bit is, with the RC213 still very much a work in progress, there's even more to come from him in 2025. Zarco-LCR Honda was perhaps 2024's most successful new partnership, but it's clear that there are further gains to be found.
14 Miguel Oliveira
Championship position: 15th
It's a shame we didn't get to see more of Miguel Oliveira this year but, unfortunately, his injury in Indonesia removed him from contention during a point where it would've been interesting to see what he was capable of versus his fellow Aprilia riders - because that's really the story of his whole season.
He was able to race against Maverick Vinales and Aleix Espargaro when the opportunity presented itself but was closer to his team-mate Raul Fernandez than them at other times.
Ultimately it was a mixed bag of a year that didn't really match what he was expecting on full factory-spec machinery.
13 Alex Marquez
Championship position: 8th
Consistency continues to be Alex Marquez's biggest enemy. He showed us once again in 2024 that when he's fast, he's race-winning fast (or at least close to it), but when he's not fast he's been regularly the worst of the GP23 Ducati riders.
Add to that a tendency to find himself in rather complicated situations (like his Aragon mishap with Pecco Bagnaia) and it gives a feeling that more could've been taken from the season if he'd been on form on a more regular basis.
12 Brad Binder
Championship position: 5th
The big difference between Brad Binder's championship position and his ranking is really all Pedro Acosta's fault.
Binder's fellow KTM rider and 2024 rookie showed him up somewhat. And while the South African might have just pipped him for best non-Ducati in the final points tally, it shouldn't have been a battle that was only decided at the final round.
Add to that that it was another season without Binder being anywhere near the top step of the podium on Sunday and it's hard to count 2024 as anything other than a disappointment.
11 Marco Bezzecchi
Championship position: 12th
If there's one rider this year whose entire season was sabotaged more than any other by Michelin's new rear tyre, it was Marco Bezzecchi.
Yes, there was still the occasional moment of relief as he got it to work here and there, and he was at the very least able to maintain a fairly consistent baseline, but it's a long way away from the lofty heights of his 2023 title tilt.
It doesn't exactly reflect too well on his versatility as a rider, either, and Aprilia will be hoping that (like it has insisted since signing him) this was just a temporary blip exacerbated by the GP23's inflexibility.
10 Aleix Espargaro
Championship position: 11th
At various points in 2024, Aleix Espargaro reminded us of just how good he is, with impressive performances at his home Barcelona circuit in particular.
However, with a mid-season retirement announcement, there were also phases of the year where it very much felt like he was just counting down the days until the end of the season.
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The result is a final season in MotoGP of highs and lows, one where it felt like there was more on offer, but where the final result is still strong enough to count for something.
9 Maverick Vinales
Championship position: 7th
There is, of course, one shining high point in Maverick Vinales' season: his utter domination of the Grand Prix of the Americas weekend.
It was a reminder of what he can do when he's on form. But the old problem remains: that form is just not coming often enough.
As likely to be fighting for last as he was for the podium all year, it was yet another season full of inconsistencies from Vinales, and that reflects in his final championship standings.
He should have been much higher - but he still throws away points all too often.
8 Franco Morbidelli
Championship position: 9th
As late as the halfway point in the 2024 season, it would have been a surprise to see Franco Morbidelli as high as eighth on this list, because his start to the year was a disaster after pre-season injuries cost him his entire testing programme.
However, by the time of the last race of the year, Morbidelli had come close to returning to his old self: where he was back when he fought for the 2020 championship.
Yes, he was significantly aided by having Ducati GP24, and yes, he was normally the last of the four riders on that spec of machinery, but given where he came from and where he ended up, it's been an impressive season of improvement.
7 Fabio Quartararo
Championship position: 13th
It's hard to argue that Fabio Quartararo isn't still one of the most talented riders on the MotoGP grid, and what he did with an underperforming Yamaha in 2024 was nothing short of miraculous on many occasions.
He's been able to extract the absolute most from the bike and, really, while the machinery might not yet be up to the job, he's done plenty to remind us all that it won't take an awful lot more from the manufacturer for the 2021 world champion to be right back in the mix at the sharp end.
6 Fabio Di Giannantonio
Championship position: 10th
It's a shame we didn't get to see Fabio Di Giannantonio make it until the end of the 2024 season - or that he wasn't riding fully fit for much of it - because the form he started to show as the year progressed hinted at the potential for much more.
Quicker than anyone on a GP23 except Marc Marquez at adapting to Michelin's new rear tyre and flying in the latter stages of the year, the need for time off for surgery (and the shoulder injury that prompted it) is the only reason why we didn't see him at the sharp end more often.
It's no surprise at all that he's earned the latest spec of factory bike for next season.
5 Pedro Acosta
Championship position: 6th
This wasn't an easy season to be a MotoGP rookie, let alone on a KTM - but apparently Pedro Acosta didn't get that message.
He was superb in his debut year. Acosta was consistently a frontrunner from the very start of the year and actually only struggled with the bike more as time went on.
The only question mark against his name is his consistency, but rookies are expected to crash and it's significant that his falls were generally coming from closer to the battle for the podium than the back of the pack.
He absolutely showed us the talent we knew he had, and it shouldn't have done anything to alter the belief that he's a MotoGP world champion in waiting.
4 Enea Bastianini
Championship position: 4th
This seems like very much the right place for Enea Bastianini to have landed in, considering that it's hard to argue that he wasn't the fourth best rider in the season - and not just in terms of championship standings.
A regular podium contender who never quite got the best out of the GP24 package compared to Martin and Bagnaia, really the biggest mark against his CV is the fact that he allowed Marc Marquez to sneak past him in the championship standings.
It wasn't a bad season, but it's one that definitely justified the Ducati decision to replace him for 2025.
3 Marc Marquez
Championship position: 3rd
Look, there shouldn't ever have been any doubt about Marc Marquez's abilities.
He's a multiple-time world champion after all, as he very quickly reminded us when he jumped off an awful Honda and onto a good (but not great) year-old Ducati.
It was only the time needed to adapt and the difficulties presented by Michelin's new rear tyre significantly that negatively impacted his season.
Yes, there were still plenty of mistakes, mainly in qualifying, but he absolutely did enough to earn the factory seat he'll take over in 2025 - and without any adaption time, expect him to be a routine race winner.
2 Pecco Bagnaia
Championship position: 2nd
Sometimes it's the case that the runner-up in a championship has an argument for being the best performer of the season, and that's the position that Bagnaia finds himself in this year.
He was by far the most successful rider in terms of race wins, but it was his error rate that let him down.
Even so on balance, he still very, very nearly defended his title. In fact, it essentially came down to a single technical problem in the French GP - and while that might be little consolation, it means that his position as second is closer to first than ever before.
1 Jorge Martin
Championship position: 1st
Obviously, it makes sense to have the world champion at the top of the rankings - but even in a year where the argument could be made for others to hold that spot, it's still hard to deny that Jorge Martin deserves it because of the job he's done in building himself into a more complete racer for 2024.
We've seen him fight for - and lose - championships in the past, but there wasn't even a hint of the flaws that have cost him previously this season.
Plenty of times he was presented what in the past would have been a golden opportunity for him to stuff it up - but this season, he managed those situations better and came out on top.
It's a textbook example of learning from your mistakes that led to a well-deserved title.
