Question

You and your friend are standing back-to-back. Your friend runs 16 feet forward and then 12 feet right. At the same time, you run 12 feet forward and then 9 feet right. You stop and throw a baseball to your friend, who catches it. How far did you throw the baseball?

Answer 1

You would throw a baseball 9 feet and your friend would catch the baseball. Hope this helps!

Answer 2

Let's assume that you stared at the origin.  So your friend moved 16 units along the x-axis and 12 down the y-axis landing him at (16, -12), while you on the other hand run 12 feet forward along the x-axis, and 9 units into the negative y area.  This makes you at (-12, -9).  So solve graph these points.  Use the graph to count the difference between the 2 x coordinates, you should get 28, the solution for the y distance (ignore the negatives) is 3.  So we can use the Palagorien Theorem to solve.  (28)2 + (3)2 = x2.  Solve for x.

784+9=x2
793=x2
28.1602556807=x