Francisco Mejia’s Hit Streak Nears History

Editor’s Note: Wee Willie Keeler’s league was fixed to the correct National League.

Francisco Mejia is one game away from history.

The Indians’ catcher has hit safely in 44 consecutive games in a streak that began in late May in the Midwest League and that has continued through a promotion to the high Class A Carolina League.

LONGEST HIT STREAKS, PRO BASEBALL
Streak	Player (League), Year
69	Joe Wilhoit (Western), 1919
61	Joe DiMaggio (Pacific Coast), 1933
56	Joe DiMaggio (American), 1941
55	Roman Mejias (Big State), 1954
50	Otto Pahlman (Three-I League), 1922
49	Jack Ness (Pacific Coast), 1915
49	Harry Chozen (Southern Association), 1945
46	Johnny Bates (Southern Association), 1925
45	James McOwen (California), 2009
45	Wee Willie Keeler (National), 1896-1897
44	Francisco Mejia (Midwest/Carolina), 2015
44	Pete Rose (National), 1978
Sources: Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball, The Story Of Minor League Baseball, Google Newspaper Archive Bolded entries are from Major League Baseball

That puts him one game short of James McOwen’s 45-game hit streak in the California League in 2009 for the longest minor league hit streak of the modern era of minor league baseball, which was reclassified in 1963.

Mejia’s streak will also crack the top 10 hit streaks in organized baseball history if he can get a hit tonight at home against Potomac.

Wichita’s Joe Wilhoit (Western League) holds the all-time minor league record with 69 games in 1919. Joe DiMaggio actually holds two of the three longest hit streaks in pro baseball history. In addition to his 56-game MLB record set in 1941, he also has the second-longest minor league streak with a 61-game hit streak in the Pacific Coast League in 1933.

Mejia’s streak is even more impressive in that it has continued this week even after he prepared to switch teams only to find that he was still a Cleveland Indian after Jonathan Lucroy turned down a trade to Cleveland.

Mejia is considered one of the better catching prospects in the minors right now. He ranked 70th on Baseball America’s Midseason Top 100 Prospects list.

So who was Wilhoit? He was a very good hitter taking advantage of how different the minor leagues were in the early parts of the 20th century. Wilhoit had hit .274 for the big league Giants the year before. When he was let go by the Giants, he didn’t go to the highest levels of the minors (Double-A at the time) but instead landed in the Class A Western League.

“He was good enough to have been with the New York Giants the year before and to play in the 1917 World Series,” Wichita Eagle reporter Peter Lightner, who served as the Wichita official scorer in 1919, told Whitney Martin of the Special News Service in 1941 when Joe DiMaggio was in the midst of his 56-game hitting streak.

“So he was entirely too much player for the Western League, which was known in the good days as a hitter’s paradise,” Lightner said. “After facing major league hurlers the last two years, Wilhoit had a picnic. He was about 28 then, I believe, still young enough. A fine bunter and place-hitter and a great outfielder.”

Minor league records are difficult to pin down because many stats weren’t tracked years ago to the degree they are today. Hit streaks are one stat that caught the attention of statisticians, so while it is possible that a player that switched leagues might have seen records of his combined hit streak fall through the cracks, in most cases we can feel confident that we have a solid record of hit streaks going back to the start of the organized minors at the turn of the 20th century.

DAY BY DAY THROUGH MEJIA’S STREAK
DATE	POS	AB	R	H
5/27/16	C	4	0	2
5/28/16	C	4	2	1	3B, RBI
5/29/16	DH	1	0	1
6/1/16	C	4	1	1
6/2/16	C	4	0	1	RBI
6/3/16	C	5	1	3	2B
6/4/16	C	3	1	2	RBI
6/5/16	C	5	0	1
6/7/16	C	4	2	2	HR, 2 RBIs
6/8/16	DH	5	2	3	HR, 4 RBIs
6/9/16	C	4	2	4	RBI
6/10/16	C	4	1	1	HR, RBI
6/11/16	C	4	1	2	HR, RBI
6/12/16	DH	4	0	1	2 RBIs
6/13/16	C	5	1	1	HR, 2 RBIs
6/15/16	C	3	1	1
6/15/16	DH	3	2	2	2 2B
6/16/16	C	4	0	1	2B
6/17/16	C	4	1	2	2B
6/18/16	C	5	1	1	2 RBIs
6/19/16	C	4	0	1
6/24/16	C	4	0	3	SB
6/25/16	C	3	1	1
6/26/16	DH	3	1	2	HR, 2 RBI
Promoted to Lynchburg (Carolina)
6/29/16	C	4	1	2	CS
6/30/16	DH	5	0	1	2B, 2 RBIs
7/1/16	C	4	0	1	2B, RBI
7/2/16	C	3	0	1	3B
7/3/16	DH	4	0	1
7/4/16	C	4	0	2	RBI
7/5/16	C	5	2	2	2 RBIs
7/6/16	C	5	0	1
7/8/16	C	5	2	1
7/13/16	C	4	0	1
7/16/16	C	6	2	3	HR, RBI
7/17/16	DH	5	0	2	3 RBI
7/23/16	C	2	1	1	HR, 4 RBIs
7/25/16	C	5	0	1
7/26/16	C	3	1	2	RBI
7/28/16	C	4	0	1	RBI
7/29/16	C	4	0	1
7/30/16	DH	4	1	1
8/1/16	C	4	1	1	RBI, SB
8/2/16	C	3	0	2	2 RBIs