Where Would the Yankees Be This Season If Not For Max Fried?

The New York Yankees have been playing quite well of late, and a lot of that has to do with a couple of key players performing well.

Coming into the year, the Yankees faced a lot of concerns with injuries to impact players, most notably in the rotation.

During spring training, New York suffered what looked like it was going to be a crippling blow to the campaign when Gerrit Cole had to undergo Tommy John surgery.

As the former American League Cy Young and the ace of the staff, most teams would not have been able to survive an injury to a player of that caliber.

However, the Yankees were built to be the best team in the AL, and fortunately invested heavily in the rotation during the offseason.

Will the New York Yankees Continue to Thrive Without Cole?

Tim Britton of The Athletic (subscription required) recently wrote about the importance and the impact that free agent signing Max Fried has had on the team.

“New York is in first place thanks largely to Max Fried’s otherworldly performance to start the season; the Yankees are 8-0 when he starts, and under .500 behind anyone else.”

It’s rather shocking the impact that Fried has had on the team in the early part of the year. Even though the southpaw has been a multiple-time All-Star, New York couldn’t have expected him to be as good as he has been so far.

Currently, he has totaled a 6-0 record with a ridiculous 1.05 ERA. While his record is great, the most important thing is that the Yankees haven’t lost a game that he has started. Fried is trending toward going toe-to-toe this year with Tarik Skubal of the Detroit Tigers for the AL Cy Young award.

Even though the left-hander has been great, the rest of the rotation has question marks. Aside from Carlos Rodon, who has been good, New York has struggled to find consistency in the back end of the rotation.

For a team that is a hopeful World Series contender in 2025, the rotation still feels like it needs some help.

That could come in the return of the reigning AL Rookie of the Year, Luis Gil, from injury, or they might look outside of the organization.

However, the front office should be applauded for the decision to sign Fried this winter.

While there are many years to go on the contract, the early results have been fantastic. If not for the talented southpaw, the conversation about the Yankees’ chances to be a contender in 2025 would be vastly different.