On May 28, 1974, Cleveland outfielder John Lowenstein played against the Texas Rangers for the first time that season. He led off the game, reaching first on an error against Steve Hargan. On August 31 of that same year, Lowenstein struck out looking in the top of the ninth inning against Fergie Jenkins in what would be his 35th and final at-bat against the Rangers of that campaign.
In those two at-bats, he was 0-2. In the 33 ABs in between, he was 0-33. It's the most at-bats that an MLB player has ever had against an individual team in a single season without recording a hit, and it's a pretty remarkable statistic. He posted a .242 batting average on the year; had he not played against the Rangers at all, that figure would have been .260. This MLB record isn't one that many people, if any, know about, but it's also probably not one that Lowenstein is particularly proud of. Luckily for him, there's a player who could very well push Lowenstein to No. 2 on that list, and it's a name that's just a tad more recognizable.
It's Cody Bellinger of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the star outfielder just two years removed from winning the NL MVP but who's slashing a paltry .152/.269/.255 in what we hoped would be a bounce-back campaign. That certainly isn't the case, and it especially hasn't been the case when he's gone up against the division rival San Francisco Giants. To the surprise of many, the Giants still sit atop the NL West with a 61-35 record, fresh off of a series victory over Bellinger's Dodgers. And you know who certainly didn't help the cause for Los Angeles? You guessed it: Bellinger.
He went 0-4 in the final game of the series on Thursday, 0-14 across the four games overall, and is an astounding 0-27 with 11 strikeouts against San Francisco on the season. Yikes. What's more is that the Giants and the Dodgers clash again next week for a three-game series, and Bellinger should get the opportunity to either end or extend his hitless streak against the Giants. Here's how he stacks up to the 18 other players in league history — that's right, there are only 18 guys, according to Baseball Reference — with 0 hits in at least 25 at-bats against a team in a season, sorted by plate appearances (via Stathead).
Andruw Jones playing so poorly against the 1998 Phillies is fairly surprising, considering he belted 31 home runs and slashed .271/.321/.515 in a breakout season at age 21. It's even more surprising when you consider the fact that the 2000 iteration of Jones vs. Phillies resulted in the slugging outfielder batting .385 across 52 at-bats and a whopping 1.285 OPS. Weird.
But I digress. As Mike Axisa of CBS Sports noted, Bellinger's problems stem from the amount of popups he's hitting — the amount of home runs he has hit on his fly balls is significantly lower than in 2019 — and from his struggles against the fastball:
Bellinger is hitting a weak .141 with a .333 slugging percentage against fastballs this season. The MLB averages are .262 and .441, respectively, and during his MVP season in 2019, Bellinger hit .327 and slugged .661 on fastballs. Also, Bellinger is missing with 27.5 percent of his swings against fastballs. It was 19.7 percent from 2019-20 and the MLB average is 21.2 percent.
We'll see if Bellinger can turn it around before it gets even worse. One thing to watch out for is the upcoming Giants-Dodgers series and whether or not good ol' John Lowenstein holds on to his undesirable record.
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