use strict;
use warnings;
use Data::Dumper;

my @masterArray = (
                  ["this", "that", 12563, "something", "else"],
                  ["this", "that", 10, "something", "else"],
                  ["this", "that", 1, "something", "else"],
                  ["this", "that", 125638, "something", "else"],
                  ["this", "that", 300000, "something", "else"],
                   );

my @top3 = sort {$b->[2] <=> $a->[2]} @masterArray[0..2];
my $min_top = $top3[2][2];

for my $sub_aref (@masterArray [3..$#masterArray]) {
	next if $sub_aref <= $min_top;
	@top3 =  (sort {$b->[2] <=> $a->[2]} @top3, $sub_aref)[0..2];
	$min_top = $top3[2][2];
}
print Dumper @top3;