Saturday's installment of TV Asahi entertainment show "Onegai! Ranking Gold" feature a segment on voice acting, where 100 Japanese voice actors were asked to vote for their favorites in the industry. The overall favorite was Koichi Yamadera (who has a token appearance in every Pocket Monsters movie), while Megumi Hayashibara (Musashi) ranked 8th and Ikue Ohtani (Pikachu) ranked 20th on the list.


Click on image for higher resolution

The full list, with most notable role listed in parenthesis, is as follows:

1) Koichi Yamadera (Ryoji Kaji, Neon Genesis Evangelion)
2) Masako Nozawa (Son Goku, Dragon Ball)
3) Mayumi Tanaka (Luffy, One Piece)
4) Shigeru Chiba (Rei Ichido, Highschool! Kimengumi)
5) Joji Yanami (Boyacky, Yatterman)
5) Ichiro Nagai (Jigoro Inokuma, Yawara)
7) Norio Wakamoto (Cell, Dragon Ball)
8) Megumi Hayashibara (Rei Ayanami, Neon Genesis Evangelion)
9) Minami Takayama (Conan Edogawa, Detective Conan)
10) Akiko Yajima (Shinnosuke Nohara, Crayon Shin-chan)
11) Kazuya Nakai (Zoro, One Piece)
12) Hideyuki Tanaka (Taro Yamada, Dokaben)
13) Hiroaki Hirata (Sanji, One Piece)
14) Akio Ohtsuka (Moominpappa, Moomin Valley)
14) Takeshi Kusao (Hanamichi Sakuragi, Slam Dunk)
16) Kenji Utsumi (Senbei Norimaki, Dr. Slump Arale-chan)
17) Kenichi Ogata (Shishimaru, Ninja Hattori-kun)
17) Ryusei Nakao (Freeza, Dragon Ball)
19) Akira Kamiya (Suguru Kinniku, Kinnikuman)
20) Ikue Ohtani (Pikachu, Pocket Monsters)
21) Chika Sakamoto (Hajime-chan, Heisei Tensai Bakabon)
22) Yuji Mitsuya (Tatsuya Uesugi, Touch)
23) Noriko Hidaka (Minami Asakura, Touch)
23) Kappei Yamaguchi (Usopp, One Piece)
25) Kazuko Sugiyama (Heidi, Heidi, Girl of the Alps)

Source: http://otanews.livedoor.biz/archives/51817676.html.

I'm surprise Rica Matsumoto isn't even in the top 20... while Ikue Ohtani is. I don't quite know in how many shows she's been providing voice acting, but I sure hope it's not solely thanks to her work in the Pokémon series that she ranked 20th in this 'competition'...

Ohtani has a lot of huge roles under her belt, including main roles in three of the biggest series currently airing - Pikachu in Pocket Monsters, Chopper in One Piece, and Mitsuhiko in Detective Conan.

I'm also surprised Ikue Ohtani was ahead of Rica Matsumoto. I always thought she was a lot more popular. In either case its good to see Koichi Yamadera recognized by his peers for his hard work. That can often be more rewarding then any award that is given out by an academy.

Ah, I understand now. For a moment, I thought she got that 'award' just by saying 'Pi-pikachu' in 700+episodes and countless movies :o
Thanks for your answer (though, why I didn't think of looking for her profile on ANN?)

@Sunain: Well, no doubt Matsumoto would have ranked better if it had been a 'Pocket Monsters Series-only' vote.