Lewis Thorpe (baseball)


Lewis Thorpe is an Australian professional baseball pitcher for the Minnesota Twins of Major League Baseball.

Career

As an amateur, Thorpe trained at the Melbourne Aces Baseball Academy. He competed in international youth baseball tournaments. In 2011, Thorpe won the "Golden Arm" award from the Australian Baseball Federation. In 2012, he signed with the Minnesota Twins, receiving a $500,000 signing bonus.
In the 2013 season, Thorpe made his professional debut with the Gulf Coast Twins of the Rookie-level Gulf Coast League. He pitched to a 4–1 win–loss record and a 2.05 earned run average in 44 innings pitched, and a GCL-leading 64 strikeouts. He pitched in the 2013 18U Baseball World Cup after the season for the Australian national baseball team. He pitched Australia to victory against the United States national baseball team, the only game the United States lost. After the season, Baseball America named him the seventh-best prospect in the GCL. Thorpe made his Australian Baseball League debut with the Aces on 22 November 2013.
After participating in extended spring training, the Twins assigned Thorpe to the Cedar Rapids Kernels of the Class A Midwest League in June 2014, where he became the youngest player in the league. He finished the year with a 3–2 win–loss record and a 3.52 ERA in 16 games started. At the end of the 2014 season, Thorpe was diagnosed with a sprained ulnar collateral ligament in his pitching elbow. He underwent Tommy John surgery to repair the injury in March 2015, causing him to miss all of 2015 and 2016. Thorpe returned in 2017 and spent time with both the Fort Myers Miracle of the Class A-Advanced Florida State League and the Chattanooga Lookouts of the Class AA Southern League, pitching to a combined 4-4 record and 2.93 ERA in 17 total games between the two teams. The Twins added him to their 40-man roster after the season. Thorpe returned to Chattanooga in 2018, and was selected to represent the Twins in the All-Star Futures Game.
On 28 June 2019, the Twins promoted Thorpe to MLB. On June 30, 2019, he made his MLB debut.
On June 29, 2020, Thorpe made the Twins 60-Man Summer Camp roster in 2020. He made the Twins Opening Day roster in 2020.