Right-hander Zac Gallen said there was nothing new in terms of his contract status, but the Diamondbacks ace suggested Friday that the club’s run to the World Series — and the Valley’s reaction to it — might have made him view Arizona as an even more desirable long-term destination.

“I love it here,” said Gallen, who is not eligible to hit free agency until after the 2025 season. “Especially after us having the success and seeing that there’s some energy here about baseball, and the fans have proven that they want a winner here. I love it here. That’s where I’m at. If they want to decide to do something, great, we’ll sit down and figure it out and see what happens. As of right now, nothing has been done.”

Gallen, speaking before the club’s charity golf tournament at Talking Stick Resort, acknowledged the Diamondbacks had not given fans all that much to be excited about in recent years but said he was heartened by the passionate response fostered by the team’s postseason run.

Gallen always has said only good things about Arizona, but he sounded even more enamored of the state on Friday than he had in the past.

“It was good to see that there was life there, essentially,” Gallen said. “That’s a good thing. As much as we’re athletes, we’re also — for a lack of a better word — we’re performers, too. You want to play in front of a crowd. You want to have energy. It just makes your job that much more enjoyable to go out there and perform and play well in front of a crowd. To have that, I think it helped us in the playoffs.

“We saw crowds show up. When we played the Dodgers — and it’s no secret when we play the Dodgers, there are a lot of Dodgers fans here — when we played them in (the National League Division Series), to see that it was more red than blue, I think it kind of invigorated a lot of guys to be like, ‘OK, the fans are behind us here. We have fans.’ It was cool to see.”

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Gallen said he went nearly a full month this offseason being recognized and approached by appreciative Diamondbacks fans just about every time he left the house.

Last week, Gallen and the Diamondbacks avoided arbitration by agreeing to terms on a one-year deal worth a shade over $10 million.

The club and Gallen, who is represented by high-profile agent Scott Boras, are not known to have ever engaged in any meaningful long-term contract discussions.

Given the always-rising cost of starting pitching and Gallen’s increasing stature among his peers — he was ranked as the No. 3 starting pitcher in baseball by a recent MLB Network poll — he could command a massive contract on the open market. Whether the Diamondbacks would be willing to spend that kind of money remains to be seen.

After posting a 3.47 ERA in 210 innings, Gallen finished third in the National League Cy Young Award voting last season. He was fifth in 2022.

Gallen said he is hoping the Diamondbacks’ postseason success isn’t just a one-off.

“I want this thing to be a sustainable thing, not just, ‘Oh we make the playoffs once every few years,’” Gallen said. “I want this to be a place that, 'OK, that’s a team that’s shooting for the playoffs and have a really good shot.'”

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Zac Gallen praises fans for Arizona Diamondbacks' World Series run