Former UND pitcher traded from Mets to Mariners
Jul. 3—NEW YORK — Former UND pitcher Zach Muckenhirn, who became UND's first player to make Major League Baseball when he debuted for the New York Mets earlier this season, is headed west.
Muckenhirn, a Delano, Minn., native, has been dealt to the Seattle Mariners in exchange for pitchers Chris Flexen and Trevor Gott, according to Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic.
Flexen is a 29-year-old right-hander with four starts this season. Flexen is 0-4 with a 7.71 ERA. Flexen, who pitched for the Mets from 2017-19, had his best year in the big leagues in 2020 when he was 14-6 for Seattle.
Gott is a 30-year-old reliever who has pitched in 29 innings this year with a 4.03 ERA. In his career, Gott has appeared in 221 games.
After making his MLB debut against the Detroit Tigers on May 3, Muckenhirn has made two other big-league apperances — in Washington on May 14 and in Pittsburgh on June 9.
Across three MLB appearances, Muckenhirn has thrown six innings with a 6.00 earned-run average. He has struck out three.
Muckenhirn has spent most of the 2023 season with the Syracuse Mets at Triple-A.
With Syracuse, the 28-year-old left-hander has thrown 30.2 innings across 16 appearances with a 0.88 ERA. With Syracuse, he has 19 strikeouts to 13 walks.
Muckenhirn played his final college season for UND as a junior in 2015-16. UND announced it was cutting the baseball program during the middle of that season.
After visiting with numerous Power 5 programs to possibly play his final college year elsewhere, Muckenhirn elected to turn pro.
Muckenhirn was drafted by the Baltimore Orioles in the 11th round in 2016, marking a distinction as the highest draft pick in UND baseball history and breaking a mark that stood since 1968 when Alex Cooley was taken in the 17th round by the Oakland A's.
It was a long road from the draft to the big leagues.
In his last year with the Orioles organization in 2019, Muckenhirn showed success in AA with a 3.21 ERA across 37 games and later was briefly promoted to AAA that season.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Muckenhirn played in the Puerto Rico Winter League. Over 11 outings in 2020, he had a 0.73 ERA.
That showing led Muckenhirn to the Chicago White Sox in 2021 where he generated a 1.77 ERA over about 40 innings at AA. Muckenhirn played 2022 with the White Sox organization again, producing a 3.11 ERA over 47 games at AAA.
Muckenhirn signed with the Mets after the 2022 season.
