LOS ANGELES – The brilliance that the Yankees have come to know and anticipate from Max Fried eluded him on Friday, as he endured his worst begin together with his new crew in a series-opening, World Sequence rematch with the Dodgers.
Fried, signed to an eight-year, $218 million deal over the winter, entered the 8-5 loss with a 1.29 ERA over his first 11 begins, however he allowed six earned runs over 5 full innings. The childhood Dodgers fan, who went to highschool in Los Angeles, additionally totaled eight hits, zero walks, three strikeouts and 75 pitches in his first lack of the yr.
“They’re good players,” Fried mentioned after a homer-happy Yankees offense gave him a 5-2 lead coming into the sixth inning. “Obviously, a big core group of them won the World Series last year, and they know how to win games. I felt like the guys did a great job tonight putting up early runs, and for the most part, I just didn’t do my job.”
Shohei Ohtani made it instantly identified that Fried lacked his finest stuff. With the southpaw misplacing a sinker up within the zone on his first pitch of the sport, the Japanese famous person smoked the ball over the middle subject wall for his twenty first residence run of the season.
The longball tied the sport at one within the first inning after Aaron Decide additionally went deep. Friday marked the primary time in MLB historical past that each reigning MVPs homered within the first inning of the identical sport, per OptaSTATS. Ohtani, nonetheless, wasn’t executed with Fried.
The majors’ residence run chief struck one other bases-empty blast within the sixth, this time on a excessive heater over the center. The towering bomb to proper took so lengthy to return down that Dodger Stadium started taking part in celebratory music earlier than the ball landed.
“I wasn’t trying to go up,” Fried mentioned of Ohtani’s homers. “He’s a good hitter. I made two mistakes in the same spot and he hit them out.”
Two residence runs tonight for Shohei Ohtani and 22 on the yr 
#FridayNightBaseball pic.twitter.com/aEn9Jp1v2k
Ohtani’s second jack kicked off a calamitous inning for Fried, who hung his head, bent over and held his arms on his knees because the shot soared. The pitcher proceeded to give up singles to Teoscar Hernández and Will Smith.
Freddie Freeman – who took residence the 2024 World Sequence MVP – then knocked Fried out with an RBI double.
“I don’t think he had his good breaking ball going tonight,” Aaron Boone mentioned. “And then that inning, he just left some pitches in the heart of the plate.”
Freeman put the Dodgers down, 5-4, as Austin Wells, Trent Grisham and Paul Goldschmidt joined Decide in going deep over the primary three innings. However with Jonathan Loáisiga in for Fried, Andy Pages tied the sport with an RBI single.
From there, a fielder’s selection lastly obtained the Yankees an out, as Goldschmidt initiated a rundown that prevented Freeman from scoring. Max Muncy was then deliberately walked to load the bases, however Tim Hill entered and issued a free go to Michael Conforto, forcing in a run.
The Dodgers scored two extra runs on a seventh-inning Pages single off Yerry De los Santos, however they did most of their injury off Fried.
“I’m a competitor,” mentioned Fried, who blamed poor execution and placement for his clunker. “I want to go out there and win. So the fact that we had a lead and I gave it up a couple times, it’s not going to sit well with me. But you just gotta be able to use it as motivation to go out next time and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
The Yankees’ new, unquestioned ace with Gerrit Cole out for the yr, Fried had not permitted greater than two earned runs in a single outing this season previous to Friday. He had additionally held opponents to a complete of three runs on the highway.
That the ex-Courageous’s first letdown together with his new crew got here in a highly-anticipated matchup made for a disappointing night, although definitely not one the Yankees will fear about shifting ahead.
“He’s going to be fine,” Decide mentioned. “I wouldn’t say that’s struggling. He’s been the best pitcher in the game all year, and he was going up against a great ballclub that’s going to put up some great at-bats against you all night long. So he went out there and battled. You’re gonna have games like this, but we got all the confidence in the world in Max and what he’s able to do. I’m looking forward to him being out there in another five days.”
Decide added that Fried commonly amazes together with his “homework” habits. The 2 usually sit close to one another on crew flights, just for Fried to bury his head in his laptop computer, scouting stories and private notes.
“He’s one of a kind,” Decide mentioned.
Whereas some pitchers may flush a stinker just like the one Fried produced on Friday, he mentioned he’ll examine the outing identical to another. The thought is that doing so will forestall one other poor efficiency.
“It’s information,” Fried mentioned, “so I’ll try to do whatever I can to see what went wrong.”
