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:
- 0.345, 0.729 — Romy Gonzalez batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.332, 0.712 — Abraham Toro-Hernandez batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.320, 0.707 — Jarren Duran batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.319, 0.699 — Ceddanne Rafaela batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.317, 0.737 — Jacob Wilson batting vs. Didier Fuentes.
- 0.313, 0.689 — Carlos Narvaez batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.308, 0.686 — Wilyer Abreu batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.308, 0.688 — Rob Refsnyder batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.307, 0.683 — Trevor Story batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.297, 0.670 — Nick Sogard batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
Pick your favorite Red Sox player today. Gonzalez does platoon against left-handed pitchers.
The NN produces this list of batters with a high probability of collecting at least one hit:
- 0.317, 0.737 — Jacob Wilson batting vs. Didier Fuentes.
- 0.345, 0.729 — Romy Gonzalez batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.332, 0.712 — Abraham Toro-Hernandez batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.264, 0.710 — Luis Arraez batting vs. Merrill Kelly.
- 0.284, 0.710 — Bobby Witt Jr. batting vs. Mitch Keller.
- 0.320, 0.707 — Jarren Duran batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.319, 0.699 — Ceddanne Rafaela batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
- 0.286, 0.698 — Ernie Clement batting at Aaron Civale.
- 0.279, 0.695 — Xavier Edwards batting at Nick Martinez.
- 0.313, 0.689 — Carlos Narvaez batting vs. Kyle Freeland.
Gonzalez and Toro-Hernandez are the consensus top picks.
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!