Welcome back to Keeping Score, our Friday column that highlights the personalities, teams and games that sports fans are talking about — by the numbers.
2: Scottie Scheffler's rank in the career PGA Tour money list
The money list is the ranking that the players respect the most, and if Scottie Scheffler wins the BMW Championship in St. Louis this week, he'll pass Tiger Woods to become first on the PGA Tour Career Money List. Woods is the all-time money leader at $120,999,166, while Scheffler is at $119,964,411 and counting. Scheffler, the No. 1 player in golf, has also spent 205 weeks in the top spot, behind only Greg Norman (331) and Woods (683). This year's Masters champ Rory McIlroy took himself out of the running for Player of the Year after Scheffler's win last week in Memphis: "I'm not the Player of the Year, no chance, Scottie is. There's two weeks to go, but ... if he keeps playing like that and gains 9 strokes on the green every week, we're all f---ed."
$23: Price of a Honey Deuce cocktail at the US Open
The US Open's signature cocktail returns to Flushing Meadows next week without a price increase. The drink, created by restaurateur Nick Mautone for tournament sponsor Grey Goose vodka, combines vodka, lemonade and raspberry liqueur and is garnished with three honeydew melon balls. The “Deuce” debuted at a single drinks stall in 2007 for $12 and has been a US Open phenom ever since. The USTA sold 738,459 of them at last year's tournament. But while the drinks menu may be unchanged, US Open ticket prices keep soaring, with a grounds pass — a general admission ticket that doesn't guarantee a seat — now selling for more than $360 on the secondary market. Hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman, noting the USTA is a nonprofit, called these prices absurd: "The USTA’s mission is to promote the sport of tennis. How is a $363 ground pass consistent with this mission?" Ackman later walked back these remarks, noting that the face value for the grounds pass is $75.
3: Number of regular ESPN shows that feature Pat McAfee
Pat McAfee will be inescapable on ESPN this fall after the network announced that McAfee will join the Monday Night Countdown crew in addition to his College GameDay duties on Saturdays and his daily Pat McAfee Show. Presumably, he will rest on Sunday. The former NFL punter and pro wrestler is also in talks to host a weekly alt-cast of Monday Night Football on ESPN2 opposite the main Monday Night Football broadcast when the Manningcast — officially known as Monday Night Football with Peyton and Eli — takes the week off.
350: Distance in yards of Bobby Jones' longest drive
Merion Golf Club, host of last week's US Amateur tournament, was where Bobby Jones completed the Grand Slam when he won the US Amateur in September 1930. The 8th hole at Merion was also the site of Jones' longest-ever drive, as he recounted in a letter to a fan: "The longest I can remember with any degree of accuracy, occurred on the 8th hole at the Merion Cricket Club in the Amateur Championship of 1916, in my first round match against E. M. Byers. The hole is 350 yards in length and my drive went over the green." After more than a century of improvements to golf equipment, balls and fitness training, the average driving distance on the PGA Tour in 2026 is 305.8 yards.
$500: Amount that the NWSL fined Kansas City Current forward Michelle Cooper for wearing New Balance cleats
Michelle Cooper is a top goal scorer in the National Women's Soccer League and a savvy sports marketer who knows her shoe history. When Nike unveiled the Air Jordan during Michael Jordan's rookie year in 1984, the NBA threatened to ban the shoe for having too many colors. Jordan and Nike didn't blink. Nike co-founder Phil Knight figured a ban would make Air Jordans the most popular shoe in history, and he was right. When the NWSL fined Cooper $500 for wearing her New Balance Furon Elite V9 cleats in a recent game for being unapproved by the league, Cooper posted the fine notice on Instagram along with this message to her fans: “Sooooo shop New Balance (we can have matching cleats).” Somewhere, Michael Jordan is nodding, likely on a golf course.
8: Number of fights during the Dallas Cowboys-New Orleans Saints joint practice
Joint practices, where NFL teams practice against each other, have grown in importance since the NFL reduced the number of preseason games to three in 2021 when the league added a 17th regular season game. The intensity that teams bring to these workouts has increased accordingly, with approximately eight fights breaking out during the Cowboys-Saints practice. “There’s a discipline element to playing this football game," said Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer. "Unfortunately, we didn’t handle that very well today. But I don’t think we were the only culprits.”
0: First-place votes that an SEC team received in the AP preseason college football poll
Ohio State is No. 1 in the AP preseason college football poll with 40 first-place votes and Oregon is No. 2 with 14 first-place votes. But No. 3 Georgia received no first-place votes, the first time since 2015 that an SEC team didn't receive any first-place votes in the AP preseason poll. History lesson: Prior to the Bowl Championship Series in 1998, the AP poll of sportswriters and broadcasters essentially determined the national champion. In 1969, Texas and Penn State both finished the season undefeated. President Richard Nixon had attended the Texas-Arkansas game in the final week of the season and afterward gave the winning Longhorns a plaque that called them, "The number-one football team in college football's one-hundredth year." The AP poll and other polls later agreed with Nixon, a decision that never sat well with Penn State coach Joe Paterno. At a 1973 commencement speech, Paterno said, “I’ve wondered how President Nixon could know so little about Watergate in 1973 and so much about college football in 1969.”
26: Percent of Gen Z investors who say sports betting is part of their financial plan
Instead of a Roth IRA, they have the Dolphins getting three. According to a survey by Betterment, a significant portion of Generation Z investors are blurring the line between investing and sports gambling. In the survey, 26% of Gen Z investors said they treat sports betting as a deliberate part of their long-term financial strategy, and 52% have directed investing funds to sports betting at least once in the past year. “When a prediction market or sportsbook starts to feel like a retirement strategy, we have a problem,” said Betterment Chief Executive Officer Sarah Levy. Gen Z investors would do well to follow the example of their grandparents. Just 1% of Baby Boomers consider their sports gambling part of their long-term financial strategy.
9: New managers in the Premier League, the most since the 1946-47 season
Almost half of the teams in the English Premier League are starting the season with a new gaffer, not counting midseason replacements like Roberto De Zerbi at Tottenham and Michael Carrick at Manchester United. Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is the longest-serving Premier League manager. Arteta is also the only current manager to have ever won the league now that Manchester City's Pep Guardiola and Liverpool's Arne Slot have departed. Those jobs will likely be the hottest seats, too, with Enzo Maresca at City and Andoni Iraola at Liverpool facing high expectations from fans who expect to win now. "It shows the impatience of the Premier League owners and just how unpredictable the top flight is now, on and off the pitch," says Box Score contributor and UK sportswriter Neil McLeman.
2.58 million: Viewers for the Indiana Fever-Atlanta Dream game on Sunday
ESPN's broadcast of the Fever's 95-91 overtime victory over the Dream, featuring Caitlin Clark against her longtime rival Angel Reese, attracted the largest audience for any WNBA game ever. By contrast, Netflix's Field of Dreams baseball game drew a disappointing 1.66 million viewers earlier this month. Let's hope that the WNBA marketing team is developing a Hoosiers game for Clark and the Fever at Hoosier Gym in Knightstown, Ind., the home gym of fictional Hickory High. 🏀
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