In early March, the Yankees lost their ace, creating questions about the top of their starting rotation.
Gerrit Cole wasn’t going to pitch at all this season, leaving a heavy burden to newcomer Max Fried.
He didn’t blink.
Outside of a shaky stretch in July and early August, the Yankees couldn’t have expected anything else out of their $218 million left-hander.
Wednesday night in the final regular-season start of his first season in pinstripes, he continued to excel. Fried picked up his major league-leading 19th victory while lowering his ERA to 2.86 in the Yankees’ 8-1 rout of the White Sox in The Bronx.
“Just everything you would want from a guy at the top of your rotation. He’s just such a pro, so talented, such a great teammate, such an important part of our pitching culture now here. Navigated the season so well,” manager Aaron Boone said after the Yankees moved into a first-place tie in the AL East with the skidding Blue Jays. “He was a horse for us, an ace, and now looking forward to giving him the ball in October.”
Fried continued his recent string of dominance, limiting the White Sox to four hits and one earned run over seven innings while striking out seven.
Fried ran into some trouble in the second. The first two White Sox singled, then Corey Julks reached on Jazz Chisholm Jr.’s fielding error.
But he retired the next two batters and didn’t have to sweat the rest of the evening.
Over his past seven outings, the southpaw hasn’t allowed more than three earned runs. He has a microscopic ERA of 1.55 spanning 46 ¹/₃ innings and has given up just a single home run, back on Sept. 13 to Red Sox third baseman Alex Bregman.
His midseason struggles seem like a distant memory. He has also provided leadership, similar to the team’s injured ace.
“Pretty amazing to see the work he’s done with a lot of our younger guys,” Aaron Judge said. “We’re talking about game-planning, pitching. It’s almost like having another Gerrit.”
The southpaw will finish his first season as a Yankee with career highs in innings pitched (195 ¹/₃), strikeouts (189) and wins (19).
But he wasn’t ready to take any victory laps. Asked to sum up the season, Fried was already focused on taking the ball in October.
“Not finished yet. It’s been very apparent the goal of this team is to go to [the] playoffs, get deep in the playoffs and win a World Series,” Fried said. “I like to put a lot of team goals in front of how I individually do. If we come out and go deep in the playoffs and win a World Series, I’ll say it was successful. But we have a long way to go.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
