Mauer's Hot Streaks And Chasing Doubles

It has been a season of streaks so far this year for Joe Mauer.

Things started well in the first couple weeks of the season. Through 14 games, he was hitting .393/.439/.574 with two home runs and five doubles. His batting average was high, he was hitting the ball out of the park and the Minnesota Twins were surprising the experts with their .500 record.

Over the next twelve games things were not quite so pretty for Mr. Mauer. [PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]His batting line over these dozen games was .136/.269/.159, with only one extra-base hit and 12 strikeouts. He almost seemed lost at the plate and the team suffered because of his streak. Minnesota went 5-7 over these games before Mauer finally snapped out of his cold spell.

The friendly confines of Fenway Park were a welcome sight to Mauer. He put on an offensive clinic in Boston and he was back to being on another hot streak. Over the last seven games, Mauer has hit 533/.600/.833 with nine doubles and 10 runs scored. The Twins have also improved during this stretch going 4-3 to push the team back near the .500 mark.

Even with a cold streak, Mauer sees himself near the top of the leader board in multiple categories. He ranks second in all baseball with 15 doubles; Mike Napoli is only two ahead of him. His on-base percentage is good enough for 8th in baseball and ranks 6th best in the American League.

Since Mauer has already won multiple batting titles, the race for the batting crown could be a fun one to watch. Mauer's recent hot streak has him near the top of the leader board. After Sunday's two-hit effort, Mauer has a .341 batting average. This places him behind Miguel Cabrera (.379) and James Loney (.376).

Cabrera is the defending batting champ so he will probably stay near the top of this list for most of the season. Loney has never hit higher than .289 in a complete season and he is a career .285 hitter. There is a good chance Loney won't be able to keep this pace for the entire campaign.

Other important metrics have him highly ranked. Of the position players in baseball, he has the 10th best WAR. There are a number of National League players near the top of this list so Mauer is good enough for 5th on the AL list of WAR.

Many fans will be happy with the increase in power from Mauer this season. His career record for doubles is 43 in his MVP season of 2010. With 15 doubles in 33 games this year, he is well on his way to breaking that record. His personal home run record of 28 looks safe unless he goes on a weird batting streak during the rest of the season.

With the weather starting to warm up, it will be interesting to see if some of his long doubles end up turning into home runs. Target Field has never been a great place to showcase Mauer's home run power but some of the team's road trips could allow for this to happen. The MLB record for doubles in a season is 67 (currently held by Earl Webb) and Mauer has a chance to break that mark if he continues on his current pace.

Mauer is one of the best hitters in the game of baseball. In a season that is 162 games long there are going to be hot and cold streaks for any hitter. At the end of the year Mauer will be near the top of the leader board in batting average and on-base percentage. He has been an on-base machine when he has been healthy in his baseball career.

If there are more hot hitting streaks than cold streaks during the rest of the season the MLB record for doubles could fall. It might not be the most important record in the world but it could something fun to follow for the rest of the summer.

Watch out Mr. Webb, Mauer is coming for you!