The worst start of Zac Thornton‘s young MLB career didn’t seem to get to him too much.
Thornton was solid yet again on Friday, spinning six innings of two-run ball in a 6-3 win over the Phillies. The start before, he allowed two runs in seven innings. These back-to-back strong starts have followed an ugly outing on Sept. 5, when Thornton allowed an MLB career-high six runs over five innings.
Instead of letting it be the start of regression, Thornton has seized his opportunity.
Friday’s outing lowered his ERA to 3.40. He’s made 14 MLB starts, equivalent to almost half of a full season.
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Keeping walks down has been a key for Thornton. He only strikes out 6.69 per nine, and he recorded a modest four strikeouts on Friday. But he limited Philadelphia to one walk. Thornton has 1.93 BB/9 on the season. He’s walked three or fewer in all 14 of his MLB starts, and he’s walked two or fewer in 13 of them. Thornton has issued exactly one walk in each of his last three starts, and three total in his last five.
That, combined with fewer hits (74) than innings pitched (79 1/3), has led to a pretty good recipe for success.
“It’s great to just prove myself right, prove a lot of others wrong,” Thornton told reporters after the game.
Coming into his season, Thornton wasn’t necessarily in the same conversation as Nolan McLean and Christian Scott as a future stalwart of the rotation. But his audition is hard to ignore at this point.
“Hopefully I’m in this league for a long time, and I’ll always kind of have that mentality pitching, no matter how long I’m gonna be here for,” Thornton said.
Thornton had to deal with at least one baserunner in every inning on Friday.
While he found ways to limit the damage, Mets interim manager Andy Green said he’ll need to keep grinding and navigating through very start.
“If you take your foot off the gas, this level will get ya,” Green said. “He has pitched with edge and intent to prove himself every single time out. He’ll have to maintain that. There’s never a point in time where he can step on the mound and just cruise. That’s not the type of stuff he has. But the stuff plays.”
Green also acknowledged that Thornton, approximating his weight at 185 pounds, could be more like 195 “if he chooses to use the offseason appropriately.” Green believes Thornton, in turn, could increase his velocity from the low 90s into the mid 90s.
Green also said he wants to see Thornton refine his changeup and curveball.
And despite his immediate success, nothing is being handed to Thornton in 2027 and beyond.
“I think you have to train like you’ve never won anything and compete like you never lost. I think you have to live in that space constantly,” Green said. “I think that’s where his mentality has to be going into the offseason. We talked the other day about that very concept of, ‘We don’t hand you a job next year because you had 14 good starts. You have to continue to prove yourself.’
“And I think in Major League Baseball — I’ve talked to J.D. Martinez about this a lot — you look up 15 years later and you’re exhausted, because you had to continuously prove yourself again and again and again. You had to compete against yourself and the opposition. And so I do think it’s tiring. But the reward is special when you get on a team that wins baseball games and you have a great career. All of that’s out in front of Zac if he wants to go get it.”
