Beat the Streak Picks

For the past two 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. If you find this useful, please support Baseball Musings with a donation.

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.

For 2019, I am just going to publish the Log5 hit averages and the NN probabilities with parks factored in. I am keeping track of the results here. I added a graph that gives a visual representation of the probability and success each day.

First, the Log5 Method picks:

• 0.254 — Adam Jones batting against Walker Buehler.
• 0.254 — David Peralta batting against Walker Buehler.
• 0.251 — Charlie Blackmon batting against Sandy Alcantara.
• 0.250 — Jean Segura batting against Kyle Wright.
• 0.247 — Daniel Murphy batting against Sandy Alcantara.
• 0.244 — Nolan Arenado batting against Sandy Alcantara.
• 0.244 — Marcell Ozuna batting against Corbin Burnes.
• 0.242 — Jose Martinez batting against Corbin Burnes.
• 0.241 — Michael Brantley batting against Ryan Yarbrough.
• 0.241 — Jose Altuve batting against Ryan Yarbrough.
• 0.241 — Nick Castellanos batting against Trent Thornton.

The numbers here are based on hit average, Hits divided by Plate Appearances (H/PA). These number are low right now because the 2019 H/PA for position players is very low, .207. It’s usually closer to .230. So hitter 2019 averages are being regressed toward that low number.

Here are the neural network picks:

• 0.265, 0.687 — J.D. Martinez batting against Wade LeBlanc.
• 0.259, 0.683 — Jose Altuve batting against Ryan Yarbrough.
• 0.264, 0.682 — Miguel Andujar batting against Dylan Bundy.
• 0.262, 0.677 — Corey Dickerson batting against Tanner Roark.
• 0.263, 0.677 — Freddie Freeman batting against Jake Arrieta.
• 0.259, 0.676 — Michael Brantley batting against Ryan Yarbrough.
• 0.266, 0.673 — Justin Turner batting against Luke Weaver.
• 0.255, 0.671 — Wilson Ramos batting against Patrick Corbin.
• 0.246, 0.668 — Jean Segura batting against Kyle Wright.
• 0.255, 0.667 — Mookie Betts batting against Wade LeBlanc.
• 0.253, 0.667 — Christian Yelich batting against Michael Wacha.

These probabilities are very low. Once there is more data for 2019, we should see these probabilities closer to .750

Adam Jones does well in the first measure because he is a long term high hit, low walk player, and his hit average so far is high. He doesn’t appear in the NN list as the NN weights the three year parameter more heavily than the current year.

You can always test a prediction against reality with the Day by Day Database. J.D. Martinez hits .444 against Wade LeBlanc, four for nine. It’s a small sample size, but Martinez has two doubles and a home run against LeBlanc, and two strikeouts. That’s a little bit of evidence that Martinez squares the ball up against the Seattle starter and puts the ball in play.

Jose Altuve is the consensus pick, as there are very few players in common between the two lists today.

I do not guarantee results. Your best pick is going to have a 25% chance of not getting a hit. Good luck!

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