One baseball record that has long fascinated me is that of consecutive plate appearances (or consecutive at-bats, which exclude outcomes such as walks) in which a batter gets a hit. As I wrote many years ago in my Hot Hand book, this type of streak allows no room for error. You make an out and the streak is over. This is unlike the record for consecutive games with at least one hit (i.e., Joe DiMaggio's streak), where you can make an out and still keep the streak alive, as long as you get multiple at-bats in a given game.
Last night, Kansas City's Tyler Tolbert tied the MLB record with hits in 12 straight plate appearances. He flied out to end his streak. I had not heard of Tolbert previously, as he had only 85 major-league at-bats to his credit before the streak and plays for a team that does not get a lot of national media coverage. A rudimentary analysis of Tolbert's streak would put its probability at .247 (his prior batting average or probability of a hit on any given at-bat) raised to the 12th power. That yields the tiny probability of .00000005. Several factors must be taken into account to put this probability in context: Tolbert's numerous opportunities to begin such a streak in a season, the number of MLB players who bat, and the fact that we were drawn to Tolbert's case in the first place because of its unusual nature.
The above-linked article on Tolbert's accomplishment noted that the Minnesota Twins' Jose Miranda had gotten hits in 12 consecutive at-bats in 2024. I had not been aware of that event at all. Miranda appears to have had a short MLB career, playing four seasons, the most recent of which being 2025, in which he had only 36 plate appearances.
