WEST SACRAMENTO -- After etching his name into the ledger with a whole host of Athletics legends, Nick Kurtz saw the end of his impressive on-base streak on Tuesday night.
Kurtz went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts in Tuesday’s 4-1 loss to the Mariners, snapping his streak of consecutive games reaching base safely at 48. It was the longest active streak in the Majors, the longest single-season streak of 2026 and tied for the longest single-season streak in the A’s storied history.
“It’s obviously one of the best streaks I’ve ever been a part of or witnessed,” manager Mark Kotsay said.
Athletics’ longest single-season on-base streaks
2026 Nick Kurtz: 48 games
1996 Mark McGwire: 48
1932 Jimmie Foxx: 47
1917 Ping Bodie: 43
1933 Jimmie Foxx: 42
Kurtz’s streak began in the A’s home opener against the Astros on April 3, when he drew a walk against Cristian Javier in the fourth inning. He kept things going for nearly two months, rapping out 53 hits and walking 48 times during the streak for a .308/.464/.523 slash line along the way.
Building on his 2025 American League Rookie of the Year campaign, Kurtz’s .437 on-base percentage leads the Majors by a wide margin: The Astros’ Yordan Alvarez is second at .414. With a .909 OPS, Kurtz ranks 12th among qualifying hitters.
The first baseman leads the Majors in walks with 52 this season, four ahead of the next-closest players, Mike Trout and Taylor Ward (48 apiece). That puts Kurtz on pace for 155 walks, which would be the most since Barry Bonds drew a record 232 free passes back in 2004.
Kurtz possesses prodigious power, but teammates and coaches have also praised his discernment at the plate. A’s outfielder Carlos Cortes first met Kurtz during 2025 Spring Training, when Kurtz -- the No. 4 overall pick in the 2024 Draft -- was only 22. Immediately, Cortes was impressed.
“I hadn’t seen somebody with that much power have that kind of discipline and that control of the strike zone ever,” Cortes said.
It’s particularly rare given Kurtz’s age. He couldn’t quite pass the likes of Ted Williams, Stan Musial and Joe DiMaggio with his on-base streak, but ending up in a tie with a rookie Albert Pujols sure isn’t bad.
Longest single-season on-base streaks at age 23 or younger since 1900:
1941 Ted Williams: 69 games
1943 Stan Musial: 55
1975 Greg Gross: 52
1937 Joe DiMaggio: 52
2026 Nick Kurtz: 48
2001 Albert Pujols: 48
1984 Alvin Davis: 47
1941 Ted Williams: 44
Led by starter Emerson Hancock, the Mariners kept Kurtz off the bases on Tuesday to end his lengthy streak. Hancock struck Kurtz out swinging in the first inning and rang him up looking in the sixth. In between, a 103.4 mph, 371-foot line drive off Kurtz’s bat in the fourth inning found the glove of Julio Rodríguez in center field, just shy of the warning track.
Kurtz went down swinging again in the eighth against left-handed reliever Gabe Speier in his final at-bat of Tuesday’s game. For Kotsay and Kurtz’s A’s teammates, it was hard to believe the streak truly had come to an end.
“Even in that last at-bat, I still felt confident that he was going to continue this thing,” Kotsay said. “He mentioned after the game when I said it was a hell of a run and that we’ll start a new one tomorrow, he said, ‘Yeah, nothing lasts forever.’ Jokingly, I said, ‘Well, I thought you were going to last forever.’ He’s pretty special right now.”
MLB.com’s Martín Gallegos contributed reporting to this story.