I'm not saying it's impossible for Hev to get an inside the top 20 next year, just unlikely, but I suspect if there's one player who could prove you wrong it's our Hev :)
If you take indiana's numbers for Laura (2495) and Heather (1841), then play around with the date setting on the WTA rankings, you discover:
Right now - 15th and 20th End of 2011 season - 20th and 29th End of 2010 season - 22nd and 32nd
As Tony mentioned, the players ranked 16-20 (true of most of 11-15 too) didn't get many top 20 wins last season and a few of those they did get were w/o or retirements. For instance Goerges got 4, Safarova 6 (not including Fed cup), Vinci 6, Cibulkova 4 including one w/o. Even Sam Stosur managed just 5 (not including Fed cup). Bartoli 2. Petrova beat a lot of top players in Tokyo. Of course some of these players had the advantage of being seeded throughout the year.
Both Heather and Laura playing Pattaya straight after Aus. Depending on the draws, it might not take an amazing a set of results for one or even both of them to be seeded for Indian Wells.
-- Edited by kundalini on Tuesday 18th of December 2012 01:44:20 PM
I've just spotted that Pattaya is scheduled as you say the week before the Fed Cup unlike last year so maybe they will travel direct there from Australia which makes a bit more sense. Reduces prep time for Fed Cup but not a huge deal.
Can I ask where you got this information from , as I can't see an entry list for 2013.
The first post with names on tennisforum seems probably more reliable ( though don't know where they got the names from ) and includes Ivanovic and Lisicki ( who are not on the Pattaya 2012 site ) as well as Heather. But the later additions ( including Laura ) seem to have come from that Pattaya 2012 site that is linked to.
Is there a good reason as to why entry lists for WTA tournaments have to be discovered through guesswork and internet forums rather than being published on the internet like the ITF ones are?