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 versus starting pitchers:
- 0.337 — Xavier Edwards batting against Patrick Corbin.
- 0.334 — Luis Arraez batting against Mason Black.
- 0.321 — Jose Iglesias batting against Kolby Allard.
- 0.307 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting against Mitch Keller.
- 0.296 — Cody Bellinger batting against Kyle Freeland.
- 0.294 — Seiya Suzuki batting against Kyle Freeland.
- 0.294 — Jackson Merrill batting against Mason Black.
- 0.294 — Brent Rooker batting against Chris Flexen.
- 0.293 — Nico Hoerner batting against Kyle Freeland.
- 0.292 — Otto Lopez batting against Patrick Corbin.
In his 325 MLB PA, Edwards owns a .388 BABIP. That’s good news against Patrick Corbin, who has been easy to hit over the last few seasons.
The NN produces this list of batters with a high probability of collecting a hit:
- 0.334, 0.763 — Luis Arraez batting against Mason Black.
- 0.321, 0.739 — Jose Iglesias batting against Kolby Allard.
- 0.337, 0.729 — Xavier Edwards batting against Patrick Corbin.
- 0.307, 0.725 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting against Mitch Keller.
- 0.294, 0.703 — Jackson Merrill batting against Mason Black.
- 0.265, 0.700 — Yainer Diaz batting against Tyler Anderson.
- 0.285, 0.698 — Vladimir Guerrero Jr. batting against Kyle Gibson.
- 0.274, 0.693 — Trea Turner batting against Luis Severino.
- 0.260, 0.692 — Jose Altuve batting against Tyler Anderson.
- 0.296, 0.691 — Cody Bellinger batting against Kyle Freeland.
The two systems agree on the top four, in a slightly different order. Lawrence Butler does not appear on either list, but has hit in 21 straight games. The NN gives him a probability of .668.
Arraez once again is the top pick, with Edwards the consensus double down choice. Both Arraez and Iglesias are working on decent hit streaks.
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!