For the past few years Baseball Musings tried to help with playing Beat the Streak. The Day by Day Database keeps track of hit streak of at least five games. In addition, two programs produce top ten lists of players with a high probability of a hit.
Here are the top picks my programs produced for use in Beat the Streak. This post mostly explains the ideas behind the calculations. In addition, this post shows tests on the Neural Network (NN). This post discusses an NN that includes the ballpark. I updated the models, and the results of those tests are here.
The Log5 Method yields these top projected hit averages against starting pitchers:
- 0.299 — Luis Arraez batting against Bradley Blalock.
- 0.294 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting against Andrew Abbott.
- 0.289 — Luis Garcia Jr. batting against Taijuan Walker.
- 0.285 — Brendan Rodgers batting against Joe Musgrove.
- 0.285 — Marcell Ozuna batting against Jack Kochanowicz.
- 0.282 — Ezequiel Tovar batting against Joe Musgrove.
- 0.281 — Harold Ramirez batting against Taijuan Walker.
- 0.281 — Xavier Edwards batting against Paul Blackburn.
- 0.281 — Trea Turner batting against Jake Irvin.
- 0.279 — Vladimir Guerrero Jr. batting against Shota Imanaga.
It looks like a pretty good day for pitching, as no one come up with a hit average over .300. The top three here come up often in the calculations.
The NN produces this list of batters with a high probability of collecting a hit:
- 0.299, 0.746 — Luis Arraez batting against Bradley Blalock.
- 0.294, 0.725 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting against Andrew Abbott.
- 0.275, 0.716 — Jose Iglesias batting against Valente Bellozo.
- 0.281, 0.702 — Trea Turner batting against Jake Irvin.
- 0.289, 0.698 — Luis Garcia Jr batting against Taijuan Walker.
- 0.281, 0.697 — Harold Ramirez batting against Taijuan Walker.
- 0.268, 0.697 — Yainer Diaz batting against Ky Bush.
- 0.267, 0.696 — Jose Altuve batting against Ky Bush.
- 0.267, 0.695 — Amed Rosario batting against Sonny Gray.
- 0.271, 0.694 — Donovan Solano batting against Bradley Blalock.
Arraez comes up with a decent probability, likely due to the game taking place at Coors Field. He and Witt are the unanimous double down choices.
You can follow the NN results on this spreadsheet. I do not guarantee results. Your best pick is going to have about a 25% chance of not getting a hit. Good luck!