The "short list" in your post included the Clearaudio Maestro v2 Ebony, which is a stellar choice. I owned one for nearly a year and passed it along to my son when I upgraded to another cart that sells for about 3X the price. Interestingly, there was no dramatic improvement, which led me to conclude that the CA Maestro is a bargain that offers a very high price-to-performance ratio. A number of audio mags have given high marks to the Maestro, so if you can get a loaner to audition in your system, I think you'll like it very much.
For comparison purposes, you might look at my virtual system for details about my analog front end. The name of my virtual system is "Scott's penultimate system".