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:
- 0.344 — Jackson Chourio batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.338 — William Contreras batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.322 — Sal Frelick batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.318 — Luis Arraez batting against Logan Webb.
- 0.310 — Eric Haase batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.310 — Brice Turang batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.309 — Garrett Mitchell batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.306 — Blake Perkins batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.301 — Trea Turner batting against Darren McCaughan.
- 0.300 — Willy Adames batting against Ty Blach.
Blach liners matter, as opponents manage a line drive against him 25.2% of the time. The Brewers look like good bets to take advantage of that, although they are playing in Milwaukee today. Note that the Nationals and Pirates play a doubleheader, so be careful picking from those games.
The NN produces this list of batters with a high probability of collecting a hit:
- 0.318, 0.751 — Luis Arraez batting against Logan Webb.
- 0.344, 0.721 — Jackson Chourio batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.294, 0.721 — Jose Iglesias batting against Jakob Junis.
- 0.338, 0.716 — William Contreras batting against Ty Blach.
- 0.301, 0.709 — Trea Turner batting against Darren McCaughan.
- 0.287, 0.707 — Yainer Diaz batting against Eduardo Rodriguez.
- 0.261, 0.703 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting against Bailey Ober.
- 0.283, 0.701 — Jose Altuve batting against Eduardo Rodriguez.
- 0.287, 0.701 — Jackson Merrill batting against Logan Webb.
- 0.283, 0.697 — Luis Garcia Jr. batting against Mitch Keller.
- 0.277, 0.697 — Harold Ramirez batting against Mitch Keller.
The NN list depends more on the batter than the pitcher, so this list produces a more diverse list of teams. It’s the fourth day in a row for a high probability of a hit from Arraez, who owns a six-game hit streak. Chourio ranks as the consensus top pick, with Arraez the consensus double down pick.
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!