Yankees, fans have to be happy about Max Fried's resurgence
The Yankees' Max Fried pitches against the Orioles during the first inning at Camden Yards on Thursday in Baltimore. Credit: AP/Stephanie Scarbrough
BALTIMORE — One comment by Max Fried after his 13-strikeout performance Thursday night against the Orioles had the potential to simultaneously delight Yankees fans and instill fear in any club the Yankees might face come October.
“I feel like I did toward the beginning of the year,” Fried said after a 7-0 victory over the Orioles in which he allowed three hits and a walk in seven innings and matched his career high in strikeouts.
From the beginning of the season until the end of June, Fried was as good as any pitcher in the American League. That includes the Tigers' Tarik Skubal, currently the presumed American League Cy Young Award winner.
Fried finished June with a 10-2 record and a 1.92 ERA through 17 starts and was very much in the discussion of Cy Young Award candidates as well as a co-favorite with Skubal to start the All-Star Game in Atlanta.
But a nosedive quickly followed, with Fried going 3-3 with a 6.80 ERA in his next eight starts. He was forced out of the third of those, July 12 against the Cubs, with a blister on his left index finger. Though he insisted before his next start on July 23 in Toronto that that issue was behind him, he allowed six runs (four earned) in an 8-4 loss.
Rock bottom came in the eighth game of that stretch, Aug. 16 in St. Louis, when Fried allowed a season-high seven runs, which bumped his ERA to a season-high 3.26. The offense saved Fried from taking the loss against the Cardinals — the Yankees won, 12-8 — but he sounded at wits' end in discussing his issues and how to fix them.
“I don’t know in this moment I have the best answer for you on that,” Fried said that night in St. Louis. “I definitely have to change something. Mechanics are fine. Just haven’t been sharp and haven’t had the good results . . . I’m working hard in between to make the best adjustments that I can, and they haven’t really been showing.”
That changed in his next start, Aug. 22 against the Red Sox, when he threw six scoreless innings in a 1-0 loss. Fried has continued along that track since, and just in time, with October — and a Game 1 start in whatever first-round series the Yankees find themselves — beckoning.
Fried (18-5, 2.92 ERA) is 5-0 with a 1.60 ERA and a 1.07 WHIP in his last six starts, and Thursday night's game, represented his best start as a Yankee.
“He painted,” Orioles interim manager Tony Mansolino said, according to MLB.com, after Fried’s nearly flawless 87-pitch outing. “I looked at a few of the pitches on the iPad, just trying to figure out what he was doing so differently. That catcher’s setting up on the black, and he’s hitting the glove most of the night. That is an ace right there, without a doubt.”
Of his struggles, Fried said: “I think any time you go through a rough patch, if you learn from it and you’re able to make adjustments, there’s a bright side to it. Obviously, I wish I didn’t go through it. Not ideal. You want to go out there and win games and not put the team in a hole or give up leads. Wish I could have learned the lesson a little differently, but it’s always about making an adjustment. This league’s going to adjust to you, and you’ve got to be able to adjust back.”
Fried said those adjustments revolved around him returning to the kind of pitcher he’s always been — one who doesn’t chase strikeouts, Thursday’s results notwithstanding, and induces contact with his unpredictable seven-pitch mix.
“Just sticking to my strengths. I’ve got a lot of pitches, I mix speeds a lot and I’m leaning into that,” he said. “I trust the defense behind me. They’re making some really nice plays and giving me the confidence that if I throw the ball over the plate that [the out is] going to get made. It’s a team game. I’m going out there trying to win the game. I don’t really know my stats while I’m out there. As long as we have more runs than the other team, I’m pretty happy.”
Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.
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