Numbers Game: Dissecting Ichiro, Furyk, Olympic milestones

We’ve hit a historically potent month for Florida’s annual hurricane season, and Mother Nature has supplied plenty of rain in August thus far.

There’s been some sunshine, too, and it’s allowed some steady practices on the gridiron in preparation for the 2016 high school football season.

Here at Numbers Game, we’re going to examine a couple more compelling high school football digits to chew on before the year starts with Kickoff Classics on Aug. 19. We’ll also take a look at some key numerals from this past weekend around the sports world.

So let’s dig in:

2

Ichiro Suzuki became just the second player in Major League Baseball to collect his 3,000th career hit with a triple when he joined the exclusive club on Sunday against the Colorado Rockies. Ichiro is the 30th member of the 3,000 hit club and is the seventh player in that club to also have 500 career stolen bases. He’s the first Japanese-born member of the 3,000 hit club and THE fourth to be born outside the United States.

10.6

Average distance, in feet, for Jim Furyk’s birdies on Sunday at the Travelers Championship en route to the first 58 in PGA Tour history. Furyk didn’t exactly light things up before Sunday’s final round. He entered with a scoring average of 71.42 for his previous 19 rounds, which included just four rounds in the 60s. Still, he managed to drop 10 birdies, including seven in a row, and an eagle from 135-yards out to etch his name into the record books.

18.59

Average number of yards per reception for Manatee High’s Tarique Milton last season. That was tops on a team that featured Kavious Price (Kent State) and Reggie Carter (37 catches for 583 yards) last fall. Milton’s been on an upward trajectory heading into his senior year, picking up offers left and right from the likes of Michigan State and Iowa State, to name a couple.

8.36

Yards per carry for Braden River’s Raymond Thomas last season in eight games. Thomas, who tore his anterior cruciate ligament in the Pirates’ district-clinching victory over Palmetto last October, was cleared for contact last week to complete his rehab from the injury.

7

Number of high school football teams in the area that can make the playoffs later this season. All six public schools (Bayshore, Braden River, Lakewood Ranch, Manatee, Palmetto and Southeast) and one private school (Cardinal Mooney) compete in district competition within the Florida High School Athletic Association. The rest of the area programs (Bradenton Christian, IMG Academy, Out-of-Door Academy and Saint Stephen’s) are either playing a national slate independent of the FHSAA or are playing as independents in the Sunshine State Athletic Conference.

19

Olympic gold medals for Michael Phelps after swimming the second leg of Team USA’s victorious 4x100 freestyle relay team on Sunday in Rio de Janeiro. That added to Phelps’ Olympic-record 23 medals (19 golds, two silver, and two bronze).

1.91

Katie Ledecky smashed the 400-meter freestyle world record by nearly two seconds on the way to her first gold medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics on Sunday. Ledecky already owned the world record in the event, and cruised to the podium after a time of 3:56.46, which was 4.77 seconds better than silver medalist Jazmin Carlin, of Great Britain. That victory margin was more than a second better than the previous six Olympics combined in the women’s 400-meter freestyle.

This story was originally published August 8, 2016 at 11:46 PM with the headline "Numbers Game: Dissecting Ichiro, Furyk, Olympic milestones."