Ichiro means everything to Ichi-meter lady

On Oct. 1, 2004, Ichiro Suzuki stepped up to the plate with the sold out crowd at Safeco Field already on its feet.

Amy Franz, who would later become better known as the Ichi-meter lady, stood in the right field stands. Her black and neon green hit-counting sign read, “257,” even with George Sisler’s single-season hit record from 1920.

“Magical would be the best description for it,” Franz said. “Excitement. And the closer he got, it was a butterflies-in-your-stomach kind of feeling: Oh, this is really going to happen.”

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Ichiro broke the 84-year-old record with a single up the middle. He went on to get four more hits that season to set a still reigning record of 262 hits. He was 30 years old at the time. Now, at 42, Ichiro has chased down another milestone in his career and joined just 29 others in the 3,000 Major League hits club.

Fanz wasn’t going to miss that one. She scheduled a 17-game trip following the Marlins after the All-Star break, and then extended it, so that she would be there for …

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