The Yankees were outbid in their efforts to bring back Juan Soto.
They weren’t going to be outbid for Max Fried.
According to Jeff Passan of ESPN, the Yankees have signed Fried to an eight-year, $218 million contract. That deal is the largest amount of money given to any left-handed pitcher in the history of the sport.What kind of pitcher are the Yankees getting in Fried?
It probably goes without saying, but a good one. In eight seasons with Atlanta after being dealt from San Diego as a prospect, Fried has forged a career 3.07 ERA across 168 appearances, with all but 17 of those coming as a starter. He’s finished in the top five of Cy Young voting twice in his career, with a second-place finish in 2022 behind Sandy Alcantara.
In 2024, Fried was solid again with a 3.24 ERA, a 166/57 K/BB over 174 2/3 innings, and made the National League All Star team for the second time in his career.
What do the advanced stats say about Fried?
Since 2020, there haven’t been many pitchers who are better at avoiding hard contact than Fried. He’s ranked in the 90th percentile in average exit velocity allowed each of those five seasons, and last year that number was in the 95th percentile at 86.3 miles per hour. One of the reasons he’s so good at avoiding hard contact is that hitters struggle to lift the baseball against the former first-round pick. He’s never had a ground ball percentage below 50 percent, and last year hitters barreled the baseball just five percent of the time with a ground ball rate of 59.2 percent; placing him the 96th percentile among all qualified hurlers.
Fried also has solid command, and while his walk rate was a career-worst eight percent in 2024, his previous success in throwing strikes makes it very likely that won’t carry over into 2025.
What does Fried struggle with?
Struggle may be a bit too strong a word, but there are some things that keep Fried from being an elite hurler; at least so far. The biggest one — the most relevant to his fantasy status, anyway — is that Fried has never been a guy who generates a ton of swings and misses. Over his career, his best mark in terms of whiff rate as a full-time starter is 27.2 percent, and while that’s not an abhorrent number, it pales in comparison to some of the other starters who might receive similar contracts. His career K/9 of 8.6 is a fantastic mark in 1994. It’s not as impressive in 2024.The other issue with Fried has been durability, at least in terms of innings pitched; although he was limited to just 14 starts in 2023 because of a forearm strain. He’s never thrown 190-plus innings in his career, and routinely finished between 165-175 innings thus far. Again, not a horrible number — especially in today’s day and age, but it’s something to keep an eye on before selecting Fried.
How about the park and defensive fit?
Seems like a pretty good one, here. Yankees Stadium can obviously be homer-happy, but for all the reasons we discussed earlier, that shouldn’t be a problem for Fried; a pitcher that hasn’t given up more than 21 homers in a season and allowed just 32 over the last three campaigns combined. The Yankees’ outfield defense currently leaves a bit to be desired, but again, the grounders are his calling card, and the Yankees’ should be a solid infield in that regard.
Should fantasy managers be happy that Fried signed with the Yankees?
Yes. Maybe not an emphatic yes, but yes.
Fried was reportedly down to the Red Sox, Blue Jays and Yankees before he ultimately landed with the empire, and at least in this writer’s humble estimation, this was the best of the fits. Sure the Yankees lost Soto, but it still seems like a pretty solid offense behind him, so there should be plenty of chances to pick up victories.
Fried also won’t be counted on to be the ace of the Yankees’ staff — there’s that Gerrit Cole fella who takes that mantle — but he should slide into the No. 2 spot behind Cole and just ahead of Carlos Rodon. That should allow him to make plenty of starts, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Fried set a career high in innings for 2025.The strikeouts won’t make Fried a fantasy ace, but he’s certainly good enough to rank among the better SP2 options to begin the year.