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Our engine ran 10,000 Monte Carlo plate appearances of Mookie Betts against Justin Verlander at Comerica Park. It gives a 24.3% probability of a hit per plate appearance, with 10.3% strikeouts, 8.5% walks and 2.6% home runs per PA. Average simulated length: 3.56 pitches per plate appearance. No raw head-to-head rate drives any of these numbers; the inputs are regressed multi-season rates for both players (methodology below).
| Outcome | Sim probability | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| Walk | 8.5% | |
| Strikeout | 10.3% | |
| Hit by pitch | 0.6% | |
| Single | 16.7% | |
| Double | 4.8% | |
| Triple | 0.3% | |
| Home run | 2.6% | |
| Batted-ball out | 56.3% |
Where the simulated plate appearances ended, and the hit probability conditioned on that count.
| Count | PA ends here | P(hit) at count | K / BB |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1-2 | 15.0% | 27.2% | |
| 0-0 | 14.4% | 30.7% | |
| 0-1 | 13.6% | 30.4% | |
| 0-2 | 13.2% | 29.6% | |
| 2-2 | 9.9% | 31.8% | |
| 1-1 | 7.2% | 29.5% | |
| 3-2 | 5.8% | 0.0% | |
| 1-0 | 4.6% | 28.7% | |
| 0-3 | 4.3% | 0.0% |
Career line: 25 PA, 1 hits (0 HR), 3 BB, 3 SO. .045 AVG / .205 OPS. Statcast-era pitch log: 36 PA across 7 seasons (2015–2025).
| Season | PA | H | HR | BB | SO | OPS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | .000 |
| 2016 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | .000 |
| 2017 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | .333 |
| 2019 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 |
| 2023 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .666 |
| 2025 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | .250 |
Read rate: 25 career PA is 0.0% of one full batter season. One extra dropped popup changes the career average by 4.5 points.
Re-running the same 10,000 simulated PAs with Comerica Park's factors (hit 0.98x, home run 0.91x) moves the hit probability from 25.1% in a neutral park to 24.3%, a -0.8-point move.
Justin Verlander's 2026 pitch mix (23,825 pitches tracked).
| Pitch | Usage | Avg velo | Whiff / swing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Four-Seam Fastball | 53.2% | 95 mph | |
| Slider | 24.1% | 87 mph | |
| Curveball | 16.7% | 79 mph | |
| Changeup | 4.6% | 86 mph | |
| Sweeper | 1.0% | 81 mph | |
| Cutter | 0.2% | 90 mph | |
| Sinker | 0.1% | 94 mph |
| Pitch | PA | H | K | Whiff / swing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Four-Seam Fastball | 23 | 2 | 1 | 0% |
| Slider | 12 | 1 | 3 | 0% |
Inputs: Mookie Betts's and Justin Verlander's last-three-season lines (3426 PA / 1837 BF weighted 1x/2x/3x by recency), shrunk toward league average, blended with a log5 odds-ratio matchup model, conditioned on real league count-level pitch and batted-ball frequencies, and park-adjusted with committed park factors. The count process is calibrated per pair so simulated strikeout and walk rates land within 0.3% of the model targets (this page: 0.03% K error,0.01% BB error).
Head-to-head history never enters the simulation; a batter-pitcher pair shares a few dozen career PAs at most, and honesty means the model's priors are the players' own multi-season tendencies, not a 30-PA fluke. Full engine notes on the methodology page.