Max Fried signs massive eight-year pact with Yankees; Red Sox fall short
The Red Sox fell short on one of their top free agent pitching options.
The Yankees agreed to sign free agent left-handed pitcher Max Fried to an eight-year, $218 million deal, according to ESPN’s Jeff Passan. It’s the largest deal ever given to a left-handed pitcher, eclipsing the $217 million deal that David Price signed with Boston nine years ago.
The Red Sox made a serious run at Fried, according to MassLive’s Sean McAdam, but the Yankees’ bid was described as “significantly ahead” of what Boston offered.
“Can’t get into specifics but given our needs and what we intend to address this offseason, it’s safe to say we were, we are and we intend to remain on top rotation options,” chief baseball officer Craig Breslow said to reporters on Tuesday afternoon.
Burnes is now the top free agent hurler on the market and the Red Sox are expected to prepare an offer for the right-hander. The Giants and the Blue Jays are also in the sweepstakes to land the former Brewers and Orioles ace. The 2021 National League Cy Young winner posted a 2.92 ERA in Baltimore and made at least 28 starts for the fourth consecutive season.
“Starting pitching is our biggest area of need,” Breslow said Monday at the Winter Meetings in Dallas. “We’re having a ton of conversations with free agents and with teams, thinking about any number of paths to improving that. We have both a need for improving the quality and also the depth.
“Nobody has yet solved injury prevention, and if we find ourselves in a situation where some of our starters start to miss time or start to regress, we want to make sure there isn’t a massive drop-off for what we have available. We also want to make sure we are improving the quality and targeting guys who are pitching at the front of the rotation.”
The Red Sox had talks with the Mariners on Bryan Woo and Bryce Miller, but that hasn’t gained much traction. Talks reportedly centered around Triston Casas, but Seattle doesn’t appear to want to deal from their young rotation.
The two sides could revisit talks if Seattle is interested in trading Luis Castillo; it’s not known if the Red Sox have interest in the 31-year-old righty. The All-Star hurler went 11-12 this past season with a 3.64 ERA while striking out 175 batters in 175 1/3 innings. Castillo not only eats innings, but he’s been very reliable since joining the Mariners, making 30 starts or more in each of his two full seasons in Emerald City.
Breslow has also maintained the importance of building his pitching depth through their pipeline while attempting to land an ace.
“You take that on a case-by-case basis,” said Breslow. “If you’re always trading for the bona fide ace, the guy who has established himself, then it’s going to take a pretty significant dent out of your future. One thing baseball front offices have become pretty good at is recognizing the underlying stats and metrics, especially in pitching—pitch data and performance data—and being able to project who is likely to become a top-of-the-rotation pitcher.
“Our goal is to create this internal development pipeline that we can complement via free agency or trade so that we have this constant, replenished talent that enables us to not just be successful in 2025 and 2026, but for a five-to-seven-year run.”
Breslow has said repeatedly that it’s important to “raise the ceiling” of the Red Sox rotation that should include Tanner Houck, Kutter Crawford, Brayan Bello, and Lucas Giolito but with Snell and Fried off the board, his options are thinning out.
