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:
- 0.324 — Jacob Wilson batting vs. Charlie Morton.
- 0.283 — Freddie Freeman batting at Erick Fedde.
- 0.278 — Heliot Ramos batting vs. Bryce Elder.
- 0.276 — Ryan O’Hearn batting at Luis Severino.
- 0.274 — Luis Arraez batting at Jose Quintana.
- 0.273 — Ronald Acuna batting at Logan Webb.
- 0.272 — Isiah Kiner-Falefa batting vs. Ranger Suarez.
- 0.270 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting at Adrian Houser.
- 0.270 — Jackson Merrill batting at Jose Quintana.
- 0.268 — Aaron Judge batting vs. Garrett Crochet.
- 0.268 — Austin Riley batting at Logan Webb.
- 0.268 — Josh Naylor batting at Nick Martinez.
- 0.268 — Manny Machado batting at Jose Quintana.
A reader asked for an indication of home or away for the batter. So “vs.” indicates the batter is home, at indicates the batter is away.
Wilson owns a seven game hit streak during which he posted a 16 for 31. Note that he is the only batter today with a high projected hit average.
The NN produces this list of batters with a high probability of collecting at least one hit:
- 0.324, 0.746 — Jacob Wilson batting vs. Charlie Morton.
- 0.283, 0.713 — Freddie Freeman batting at Erick Fedde.
- 0.274, 0.710 — Luis Arraez batting at Jose Quintana.
- 0.268, 0.706 — Aaron Judge batting vs. Garrett Crochet.
- 0.270, 0.697 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting at Adrian Houser.
- 0.270, 0.695 — Jackson Merrill batting at Jose Quintana.
- 0.264, 0.692 — Trea Turner batting at Andrew Heaney.
- 0.276, 0.690 — Ryan O’Hearn batting at Luis Severino.
- 0.273, 0.688 — Ronald Acuna batting at Logan Webb.
- 0.272, 0.684 — Isiah Kiner-Falefa batting vs. Ranger Suarez.
The two systems agree on Wilson and Freeman as the double down picks. Fedde pitches around Freeman, with five of the six walks issued intentional.
Also note that the suggested players when choosing a batter in Beat the Streak now go out to three digits, make the probabilities comparable to the NN probabilities.
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!