Max Fried Continues His Excellence

Outside of a maddening Devin Williams shit show on Saturday, the Yankees completed a splendid weekend playing at their spring training facility by winning three of four games against their AL East rival and 2025 Steinbrenner Field tenant, the Rays. Lets get to it. 

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If there’s anything to glean from the first three weeks of the Yankees season, it’s this: The $218 million commitment they made to Max Fried is looking like a very good investment.

After struggling in his first start as a Yankee that day when they hit nine home runs and scored 20 runs, but he couldn’t pitch the requisite five innings to get the win against Milwaukee, Fried has been the ace the Yankees have needed him to be.

Sunday in Tampa, Fried was masterful and he keyed the Yankees 4-0 victory which gave them their third win in the four-game series against the Rays, a series they should have swept, but we’ll get to that down below.

Before the official scorer made a controversial decision prior to the eighth inning starting, we all thought Fried had a no-hitter going. Instead, a ground ball back in the sixth inning that Paul Goldschmidt booted and was originally and properly scored an error, was changed by this dummy in the press box just before Fried took the mound in the eighth. That decision immediately ended Fried’s no-hitter and left everyone shaking their heads in disbelief.

The guy’s reasoning was that even if Goldschmidt made the play cleanly, speedy Chandler Simpson would have beaten Fried to the bag for a single. Yeah, probably, but with a no-hitter in progress, that took huge balls to make that scoring change and I really don’t know why it was necessary. Read the room, man. No big deal if Fried had already allowed a hit, but why make the change in this case? Imagine the uproar if Fried had not allowed another hit.

“Look, we’re not going to beat (Simpson) to the bag,” Aaron Boone admitted. “So I get it, but it makes it a little dicey when it’s within the game or obviously with a no-hitter going on. But the reality is, it was a hit.”

“I had no idea," Fried said about the scoring change. “I looked up and saw two hits. It is what it is. I’m just happy we got the win.”

YES play-by-play man Michael Kay could not believe it when they came out of the commercial to start the bottom of the eighth. “No you didn’t miss a batter,” Kay told us. “I am absolutely flabbergasted, ladies and gentlemen. The scorekeeper here at Steinbrenner Field, a man by the name of Bill Matthews, has changed the Simpson E3 into a hit while the Yankees were in the dugout. Just unfathomable. Either you call it when it happens, you don’t wait three innings to go by. It’s just unbelievable. … He is going to have a lot of questions thrown at him and he’s going to have to give some pretty good answers. I can’t believe this has happened.”

Official scoring in MLB has never been worse because it is now almost impossible to be charged with an error. That’s the way MLB wants it, I guess because they want batters to have better batting averages in an era when so few do, so the only way you get an error these days is to botch a play so badly that a Little Leaguer could have made it.

“I scratch my head at the official scorers nightly,” Boone said. “They throw an error at Yankee Stadium up on the board and then we go to these other places and they can fire up a hit with the best of them. It’s a different game in every other park, it really is.”

In the end it didn’t matter once Fried gave up a clean single in the eighth, but it still sucked to have the no-hitter taken away on a technicality.

Anyway, that unfortunate weirdness did not detract from the fact that the Yankees took on a division rival that usually gives them fits and won three out of four games in the series, so even with another Devin Williams meltdown that cost them a clean sweep, this was a very productive weekend for the Yankees.

April 17: Yankees 6, Rays 3

➤ I’ll admit, I turned this off right around the time Will Warren was heading to the showers in the second inning, proving once again that he is not a major league pitcher. My wife, Easter-visiting son and I continued watching the awesome medical drama on Max called The Pitt. If you have that streaming service, I highly recommend it. What a great show.

➤ Obviously, I was checking in on my phone and then watched all the highlights, and yes, I was quite surprised to see the Yankees overcome Warren’s ridiculous outing where he threw 53 mostly lame pitches and lasted just 1.2 innings. It was appropriate that the game was played in the Yankees’ spring training facility and the home of their rookie league team, the Tampa Tarpons, because that’s what Warren is, a minor leaguer.

➤ It was amazing he only allowed one run despite giving up four hits and two walks and that was because Aaron Judge threw a runner out at third in the first inning, and Ryan Yarbrough struck out Brandon Lowe with the bases loaded in the second to prevent more damage. Of course Yarbrough is almost as bad as Warren and he gave up a go-ahead two-run homer to Junior Caminero in the third and it felt like it would be a lost evening, hence my departure.

➤ Instead, Tim Hill, Ian Hamilton and Williams blanked the Rays the rest of the way and the Yankees were able to score twice in the fifth and three times in the sixth to win their fourth straight.

➤ The big blows were a solo homer by Oswaldo Cabrera in the fifth off Rays starter Taj Bradley, and then Ben Rice’s fourth hit of the night, a two-run single in the sixth that made it 6-3. This was Rice’s first career four-hit game, though I think his favorite game is still his three-homer explosion last year against the Red Sox which happened to occur on my daughter Caroline’s wedding day.

➤ Jazz Chisholm, who was down to .169 at night’s end, showed his frustration and got thrown out of the game in the seventh arguing balls and strikes. He should have been called out on the pitch before but the ump blew that one, and then in what felt like a makeup call, the ump blew the next pitch, too, calling it a strike when it wasn’t and Jazz lost his mind. MLB suspended him one game for posting his irritation on X during the game, a rules violation per the CBA, but he appealed the suspension - I have no idea why - and he was able to play the rest of the series, not that he did much of anything which has been a theme for him so far this year.

What they said in Thursday’s clubhouse

• Rice on being the visitor at Steinbrenner Field: “It was a little weird being on the visiting side today, but I’m glad we were able to come out with the win. Honestly, the game itself is the same thing. You’re just going out there and playing. At the end of the day, it’s just another away game, and we did our thing.”

• Boone: “What a great team effort. Position players’ at-bats, grinding away. Obviously, the bullpen coming up huge to different degrees. … It’s a feel-good one right there.”

• Warren: “I just think the execution wasn’t quite where we wanted it. I think it comes down to you don’t have to be so fine.”

April 18: Yankees 1, Rays 0

➤ I love home runs and offense as much as the next guy, but 1-0 games can be great and this was certainly a fun game to watch, and it was a bonus that the Yankees won it.

➤ The teams combined for just eight hits, and the only run came in the second inning when Mr. Single, Goldschmidt, led off with a blooper, JC Escarra drew a four-pitch walk from Drew Rasmussen, and after Anthony Volpe whiffed, Trent Grisham lashed a two-out single to center to send home Goldschmidt. That was it, but the night was far from over.

➤ Carlos Rodon was terrific with six innings of shutout ball, one of his best outings as a Yankee. He allowed just two hits and though the four walks were a problem, he managed to escape every jam, and he had a lot of help with that.

➤ The first two men in the first inning reached base for the Rays and Rodon then struck out the next three; in the second, Chisholm and Volpe turned a nice double play; in the fourth, Volpe made a great play in the hole and Goldschmidt made a great play on the throw to come off the bag and tag the runner out; in the fifth Goldschmidt made a heady play to nail Jose Caballero who wandered off third with one out to blow a great chance to score, and later in the inning with the tying run at third again, Rodon struck out Yandy Diaz; and in the seventh with Mark Leiter in relief, Jonathan Aranda led off with a shot into the right-center gap and Grisham corralled the ball at the wall, hit the cutoff man Volpe, and he fired a laser to Oswaldo Cabrera to nail Aranda who committed a cardinal sin of making the first out at third base. An outstanding night in the field for the Yankees.

➤ The bullpen was great, too. Leiter struck out the last two men he faced, Fernando Cruz was again lights out in a 14-pitch 1-2-3 eighth with two whiffs, and with Williams getting a breather, Luke Weaver came in throwing heat and struck out two and got a game-ending pop-up.

➤ Goldschmidt had three singles and he now leads MLB in that category with 22, and he also leads with 10 multi-hit games. Rice almost had a two-run homer in the eighth by Caballero leaped over the wall to rob him. As I said, this was a fun game to watch, even though that particular moment was frustrating.

What they said in Friday’s clubhouse

• Volpe on the defense: “We work really, really hard on the plays on the physical side, but I think the communication has been great. Guys are feeding off each other and just want to back up the pitchers. It’s kind of a contagious feeling on defense; once the ball is put in play, it’s going to be an out.”

• Rodon on the defense: “I look back at the game defensively and we were pretty impeccable. We took some hits away. I think it’s just a great team win. (Volpe) is just such a tremendous athlete. He’s so good with his glove. Getting extra outs for us there is huge, especially on a day when I walked four and he’s just cutting down outs there.”

April 19: Rays 10, Yankees 8 (10)

➤ Williams had the night off on Friday; I wish he had gotten the day off on Saturday. This goddamn guy is really starting to test our patience, isn’t he? This was an absolutely deplorable, horrendously shitty loss for the Yankees and while he didn’t blow this game alone, Williams played the starring role.

➤ Yes, there was some really bad luck in the form of soft contact hits, and Cabrera lit the initial fuse on the Rays’ four-run rally when he air-mailed a throw from third on what should have been a routine play and the second out. But when that happened, Williams seemed to melt. He compounded the problem by walking Ben Rortvedt who came into this series with no hits on the season, but in this game had a two-run single off batting practice stiff Carlos Carrasco, and then drew this inexcusable walk from Williams. My God, throw the damn ball over the plate to a non-hitter like this and he’ll get himself out.

➤ From there it was meltdown city. Chandler Simpson got his first MLB hit by poking a weak fly ball double down the line for one run. Yandy Diaz beat out a slow infield single to Volpe on which I thought Volpe was way too lackadaisical on. If he had charged that, he probably would have gotten the out but he didn’t and that was another run that made it 8-6. And after a stolen base, Brandon Lowe hit a two-run single to tie the game. The Rays might have won it in the ninth but Cabrera made an incredible play to start an inning-ending double play, a few batters too late for him since it was his miscue that started all the bullshit in the first place.

➤ And then of course, the Yankees continued their struggles in extra-inning games. Even with the automatic runner starting at second, and then Grisham singling that man, Volpe, to third with no outs, the Yankees put up three pathetic, useless at bats by Cody Bellinger, Cabrera and Escarra and didn’t score. In the bottom of the 10th, Yoendrys Gomez threw two pitches, the second of which was launched for a walk-off homer by Aranda. As I said, just an utterly deplorable loss.

➤ Carrasco stunk again which was no surprise. He started the fourth with a 6-1 lead after the Yankees put up three runs in the top half, and he promptly gave those three right back. Carrasco has nothing left, just like Stroman. He can barely throw 90 mph, and if he’s not painting the corners and also getting help from the umpire, he’s dead. He gave up four runs on six hits and two walks in his four innings.

➤ The bullpen was great until it wasn’t. Ian Hamilton, Leiter and Weaver combined for four scoreless, hitless innings, the only blemish a walk by Hamilton. And when the Yankees tacked on two runs in the top of the ninth, the game should have been over. Sadly, it wasn’t, and because he started with a four-run lead, Williams didn’t even get tagged with a blown save because it wasn’t a save situation. Williams now has a 9.00 ERA and a disgusting 2.250 WHIP.

➤ Ben Rice twice got hit by pitches, and the second one nailed him on his left elbow and he had to leave the game. X-rays were negative, but he was not in the lineup Sunday.

What they said in Saturday’s clubhouse

• Williams on his vomit-inducing day, which he made even worse with his seemingly don’t give a shit attitude: “Four-run lead, you’d like to get in and get out. Made some good pitches, made some bad ones. Not enough good ones today. I’d like to have that one back (the pitch to Lowe). Tough luck on the (Simpson) double down the line, but aside from that, I thought I threw the ball pretty well. I mean, it’s one game. It’s over. I know we have another game (Sunday). That’s really all there is to it.”

• Judge on the loss: “They put some good at-bats together at the end. That’s what the Rays have always done. They put the ball in play, they make things happen. We just couldn’t close this one out.”

April 20: Yankees 4, Rays 0

➤ Fried has allowed just five earned runs all season and his ERA is a glowing 1.42. The Rays could not touch him. He gave up just two hits and two walks and threw 102 pitches before giving way to Cruz who finished off the eighth inning and then pitched the ninth as Boone clearly didn’t want to chance anything with Williams. That was a pretty telling move.

➤ Of course, Cruz wasn’t exactly immune to creating trouble for himself. He walked the first two batters and if you were like me, you were immediately thinking that another nightmare was about to transpire. But Cruz struck out the next man and got Danny Jansen - who has way too many big hits against the Yankees in his career despite being an otherwise awful hitter - to ground into a 6-4-3 double play to end it.

➤ How about the umpires blowing the call on what should have been a homer to left by Judge? Unreal that two guys could miss that, and then Judge was punched out on the next pitch which was not a strike so Boone came out, rightly lost his cool and got tossed. Usually Boone’s antics are stupid, but he had every right to be pissed there.

➤Grisham homered on Rays starter Ryan Pepiot’s third pitch of the game, and the Yankees made it 2-0 in the third when Cabrera doubled, Judge singled, and Bellinger’s grounder plated Cabrera. In the sixth Bellinger - who has been terrible at the plate - homered for the first time in 17 games, and in the ninth, the equally terrible Wells hit just his second homer in the last 17 games.

What they said in Sunday’s clubhouse

• Fried on his performance: “I’m just trying to be myself. When I take the ball, I just want to make sure we have a really good chance to win that day. When I prep, I just want to make sure that I’m leaving everything out there, no matter how I feel or what the circumstances are.”

• Judge on Fried’s season to date: “He’s incredible. Everything that people have said about him from afar, he’s the real deal. You see it up close, especially to lose a guy like Gerrit Cole, who you can’t replace, and then you sub in Max Fried to go and be that ace for us. It’s been fun to watch.”

It’s on to Cleveland for a rematch of the 2024 ALCS, won in dramatic fashion by the Yankees, if you recall, when a guy named Juan Soto hit one of the most memorable postseason home runs in team history in the 10th inning of Game 5 to deliver the pennant.

The Guardians swept the hapless Pirates over the weekend and they’re 12-9 and a half-game behind the first-place Tigers in the AL Central. They have played only six games at home and are 5-1.

Here are a few of their best players to watch:

➤ 3B Jose Ramirez: He had a three-homer game but otherwise has just one other and his on-base is a bit low for him at .333, but he’s still a great and dangerous player.

➤ LF Steven Kwan: As pesky as they come in the leadoff spot as he’s hitting .325 with a .385 on-base.

➤ DH Kyle Manzardo: Leads the team with six homers and 16 RBI, and he also has a team-high 11 walks.

➤ 1B Carlos Santana: The replacement for the traded Josh Naylor has 19 hits, second only to Kwan, but has just six RBI.

➤ RP Emmanuel Clase: He was struggling early, seemed to get on track with three straight saves without allowing a run, but then got lit up Sunday for three runs and blew the save in Pittsburgh before the Guardians won in extra innings. His ERA is a whopping 7.84, which is still better than Williams. Rough year for closers so far.

The pitching matchups are scheduled to be:

• Monday, 6:10, YES: Clarke Schmidt (4.76) vs. Gavin Williams (4.58), a righty with a three-year career WHIP of 1.322;

• Tuesday, 6:10, YES: Will Warren (5.17) vs. Tanner Bibee (5.85), a righty who was second in rookie of the year voting in 2023 and in 60 career games has a very nice 1.165 WHIP;

• Wednesday, 1:10, YES: Carlos Rodon (4.34) vs. Luis Ortiz (5.48), another righty who came from the Pirates in an offseason trade and leads the Cleveland rotation with 9.7 strikeouts per nine innings.