In his last start, New York Mets right-hander Zack Wheeler was touching 101 mph with his four-seam fastball, allowing his other pitches to flourish, and got fine results (six innings, two runs, eight strikeouts, three walks in a 6-2 win in Atlanta on April 12).

On Wednesday, the 29-year-old’s average velocity on his four-seamer was 96.4 mph (97.7 mph high), and his performance continued to trend upward after allowing 11 earned runs over his first two starts (9.2 innings; nine strikeouts, eight walks).

Despite control issues midway through his outing, Wheeler appeared to find a happy medium between blowing hitters away and methodically going after them.

Mets manager Mickey Callaway seemed encouraged with Zack Wheeler’s outing after the game, via the SNY broadcast.

“Great job by [Wheeler]. We needed somebody to pitch deep into the game. He did a heck of a job. His pitch count got up there in the fourth or so, and then he settled in and got us seven,”

“He had a really good curveball. I think that he, [Jacob deGrom], [Noah Syndergaard], they’ve got really good curveballs. If they can continue to use those pitches to offset that […] high [velocity] they have, they’re gonna have some success.”

A perfect first inning saw Wheeler induce three groundball outs, including a notable cat-and-mouse sequence with Bryce Harper.

After starting Harper off with two off-speed pitches (slider and a well-placed curveball), Wheeler attacked with two consecutive four-seamers, then dropped a 90 mph splitter on him to draw the groundout. Impressive execution.

Wheeler allowed one-out singles to J.T. Realmuto and Odubel Herrera in the second then walked Cesar Hernandez to load the bases. After a Makiel Franco sacrifice-fly to give the Phillies a 1-0 lead, Wheeler buckled down against his decent-hitting counterpart.

The Georgia native threw arguably his most impressive curveball of the day — and there were more than a few — to start off Jake Arrieta, then put two consecutive two-seamers on the outer-half of the plate to finish him off. Arrieta didn’t appear to consider swinging, but Zack attacked him with authority, nonetheless — an encouraging sign.

Wheeler climbed out of a self-dug hole in the third. After issuing back-to-back two-out walks to Harper and Hoskins and another first-pitch single to Realmuto, Wheeler struck out Herrera on three straight heaters, the last one a four-seamer that tied the young outfielder up, forcing a check-swing third strike.

After retiring four Philadelphia hitters in a row over the fourth inning and into the fifth, Wheeler gave up a long home run to Scott Kingery (107.9 mph off the bat; 386 feet) to give the Phillies a 2-0 lead.

Approaching 90 pitches on the afternoon, Wheeler set down Harper on the first pitch (another groundball) and struck out Hoskins on three to finish the frame at 90, exactly.

Despite giving up another solo homer — this one to Cesar Hernandez (101.5 mph; 393 feet) to make it a 3-0 game — Wheeler managed to waltz through the bottom of the sixth on just five pitches, affording him another inning of work — a perfect seventh that finished Wheeler’s day after 109 pitches (72 strikes).

After the game, Wheeler was focusing on the positives, including his much-improved curveball, from Wednesday’s loss, via Matt Ehalt of Yahoo Sports.

“I had [the curve] in the bullpen, felt good with it so I was definitely gonna use it in the game. I think we utilized it well,” Wheeler said. “The more you throw it the better feel you get for it; working on it between starts, here and there. It’s getting better slowly.”

Wheeler’s curve only induced one swing-and-miss on Wednesday, but it racked up eight called strikes and resulted in just two balls in play (86.9 mph average exit velocity).

However, he admits that he made two costly mistakes on the Hernandez and Kingery home runs.

“Pitch Kingery hit, I left up & he got his hands extended. Probably a dumb pitch to Hernandez. Those are two mistakes that cost me and the team a win. Other than that, I did well. Definitely need to cut down on the walks. Attack the zone early, get ahead, put guys away.”

Hitters appear to be laying off of Wheeler’s splitter (one swinging strike, two balls in play on six total offerings), but his other pitches seem to all be taking form after a rough start to the 2019 season.

His two-seamer (41 pitches; 96.1 mph average velocity, four whiffs) was his most frequently used pitch, with his four-seamer (27 pitches; 96.4 mph average), curveball (22 pitches; 80.9 mph average), slider (12 pitches; 92.1 mph average), and aforementioned splitter pulling up the rear.

When Wheeler was hit on Wednesday, he was hit fairly hard (88.4 mph average exit velocity), but that wasn’t all that often. Of the 109 pitches he threw, just 21 were put into play.

After Wednesday’s quality outing (seven innings, three runs on five hits with five strikeouts and three walks), Wheeler’s earned-run average dropped from 7.47 to 6.35. With the way this team has been scoring, Zack Wheeler’s performance could — and should — have been enough to secure a win or at the very least a no-decision.

The Mets made a futile late push and took the loss, but progress was made in any case. Onward and upward.