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Garrett Wittels started this year as an afterthought on the FIU baseball roster, set to be a late-inning replacement and little else.
Surprise! He’s headed for the NCAA record books.
With an infield single in the top of the eighth inning against Arkansas State, WIttels extended his NCAA leading hit streak to 42 games. He now sits tied for fourth in D1 baseball history with Chuck Abbott of Austin Peay, who hit safely in 42-straight in 1996.
A .246 hitter last year – including a two-month stretch where he batted just .188 – Wittels is hitting .404 this season, with 43 RBIs in 39 games. And he’s doing it without a set position either, having spent time this year at shortstop, second base, third base and even pitching in three games.
As far as the streak goes, well, Wittels prefers to have his bat do most of the talking. There are superstitions in baseball, foremost among them never doing anything to jinx a streak; so Wittels, understandably, doesn’t want to hype himself too much.
“Once you think you’ve made it, you’ll go 0 for 20,” he said Tuesday before practice. “You’ll hit the ball hard right at people, not be able to buy a hit and you won’t do anything. That’s what I learned from struggling last year. You can’t get your ups too high, and you can’t let your downs get too down, because at any time, the baseball gods will put you right back in your place.”
“It’s an unbelievable accomplishment, to say the least,” Thomas said. “We don’t ever talk about it. I don’t want to bring any more attention to it than already is there. Everybody knows, but from my standpoint, let’s just play the game, play the game. Play baseball.”
Wittels has the same approach.
“You can’t try to do too much,” Wittels said. “You can’t do something that isn’t meant to happen.”
After practice May 11, Wittels spoke to the press about the streak. He was also featured on ESPN’s First Take.
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