Nolan McLean‘s career is off to an extraordinary start. Through 14 starts, he has accomplished quite a bit. That continued on Sunday, as McLean reached 100 career strikeouts during his outing against the Rockies. While the start of this season has been difficult from a team perspective, their young ace has maintained the level he showed at the end of last season.

Through three innings against Colorado, McLean faced the minimum. Six of his first nine outs came via the strikeout, including three with his four-seam fastball. All of his pitches were working. Then, the Rockies started to have better at-bats in the fourth inning. The first three batters reached base before Troy Johnston opened the scoring with an RBI single. The bases remained loaded, but McLean was able to end the scoring threat, thanks to an inning-ending double play off the bat of Brett Sullivan.

After a clean fifth, the Rockies went back to work against McLean in the sixth. It started with a double and a walk. Then, McLean got TJ Rumfield to ground into what may have been a double play. But instead, Mark Vientos made a poor throw towards second base, which resulted in an error. McLean would leave the game with the bases loaded, failing to record an out in the sixth. The Rockies regained the lead later in the inning, which was an unearned run charged against the Mets’ starter. It wasn’t his best day, but McLean finished with five-plus innings, allowing two runs (one earned) on five hits, while striking out seven.

Don’t be fooled by his win-loss record. 1-2 for McLean looks odd, but his 2.55 ERA shows that he is pitching well. Like many of his teammates in the rotation, he isn’t getting much run support. Over his first six starts, the team is averaging 3.11 runs per game when McLean pitches. The offense has scored a total of one run in three of those games. It’s hard to win baseball games when manufacturing runs feels like an impossible task.

“We look at the lineup going out there each day, and we know how hard they’re working. It’s just a matter of time,” McLean said after the Mets dropped game 1 of the doubleheader Sunday.

Something needs to change in that regard, or solid starts from their rotation will continue to go to waste.