4-4-2025 – By Michael Castrignano – @412DoublePlay on X
Happy Home Opening Day to all who celebrate! Last year, we welcomed the then defending AL East champion Baltimore Orioles and this time, the defending American League champion, New York Yankees.
While New York had a number of tools in their belt during their pennant run last season, a newly added one is their starting pitcher for today, veteran southpaw Max Fried.
The 2022 Cy Young runner-up and long-time Braves has faced the Pirates 8 times in his career, most recently last June when he twirled 6 frames of 6-hit, 1-run ball.
In his first start donning the pinstripes, Fried got roughed up a bit, lasting just 4.2 innings and allowing 7 hits and 2 walks with 4 strikeouts, surrendering 6 runs with only 2 of them earned due to numerous errors.
As discussed previously, Fried isn’t a guy who misses a ton of bats but gets soft contact and ground balls at an elite rate.
Dating back to the start of the 2021 season, no pitcher with at least 600 innings in that span has a lower barrel rate than Fried’s and while his ground-ball rate (54.4%) is eclipsed by just Framber Valdez (62.2) and Logan Webb (59%) while only Zach Wheeler has a lower average exit velocity.
A big reason for his success stems from his big looping curve ball, which was hit at just a .153 clip last season with a .471 OPS and a 37.1% whiff rate – all of which are the best among his offerings.
Fries will work his 4-seamer/sinker in the low-90s to setup hitters and look to finish the job with the curve. He adds in a changeup and sweeper – both in the low-80s – to change location and bat speed – but the fastball/curve combo will be the main weapons to watch for today.
I wrote earlier about who would be best suited to combat lefties and hope they can jump on Fried early because this Yankees offense won’t be kept at bay for too too long.
Steel City Pirates 