What started as jockeying for Juan Soto, who spurned the Bronx Bombers for $765 million from the New York Mets, has turned into a headline-grabbing battle for best pivot.
First, the New York Yankees reportedly ponied up $218 million across eight years to sign Max Fried, the former Atlanta Braves lefty who has somehow tiptoed to the sport’s best ERA over the past five seasons among hurlers with at least 500 innings.
Then the Boston Red Sox landed scintillating southpaw Garrett Crochet, the most coveted pitcher on the trade market, from the Chicago White Sox. And most recently, the Yankees bolstered their bullpen with a deal for Devin Williams, the elite changeup-flinging closer the Milwaukee Brewers had deemed too expensive.
Fresh off a World Series appearance but now stinging from the embarrassment of losing Soto, the Yankees are looking to maintain their divisional status.
The Red Sox, meanwhile, are showing signs of reawakening after years of ownership-driven austerity with the knowledge that three of the game’s top 10 prospects could join the lineup by 2026.
It seems clear now, with the Mets and the Los Angeles Dodgers flexing financial might to secure the most astronomical of baseball’s free agent prizes, that these rivals might not be battling on MLB’s highest plane any longer. Still, humbled as they may still be, the moment in time when the behemoths of the aughts finished fourth and fifth in the AL East (just last year!) might be further in the mirror than it appears.
So if the Northeast Corridor’s constant punch-counterpunch is back, whose left-handed haymaker figures to make the most impact? And what should they do next?
Fried and Crochet encapsulate how the Yankees and Red Sox view themselves right now.
New York’s window sits propped open on Aaron Judge’s powerful shoulders. The two-time AL MVP just notched the first .700 slugging percentage since Barry Bonds in 2004 and just the 16th since integration in 1947. Soto was an incredible partner for him – they tied for the top raw value+ (RV+) in MLB last year at 206 – but the Yankees needed to move swiftly to solidify another squad around Judge once Soto departed. They have struggled to cultivate a consistent supporting cast in recent years, so a proven, readymade star was imperative.
Fried’s skills don’t tend to leave observers gobsmacked, yet they have elevated him to some high rungs on the leaderboards. Since the start of 2020, his 2.81 ERA tops the list (minimum 500 innings pitched). A lithe 6-foot-4, Fried succeeds with a quiver of arrows that fly just a little bit differently than hitters expect.
His fastball cuts and burrows in to his glove side – the opposite of most four-seam fastballs. For perspective, Fried’s adjusted Horizontal Approach Angle shows that the left-handed glove-side cut creates one of the most extreme angles on any fastball in the league, matching the arm-side run on Paul Skenes’ devastating four-seam. And just when a batter begins to get his bearings, Fried bends a sinker the other way, or pulls the string on a curveball almost 20 mph slower than his heaters.
That mix elicits lots of routine grounders, lots of dribblers, lots of weak and grounded contact of all kinds. Fried’s 70 BIP+ – meaning he’s 30% better than average at minimizing damage on contact – ranked eighth in MLB last season (min. 100 IP). And his work limiting the top-of-the-scale swings that lead to homers and an outsized proportion of MLB scoring in the 2020s might be even more impressive.
Fried has only allowed what Statcast designates a “barrel,” or optimal contact, on 4.7% of batted balls over the past five seasons, the best rate among pitchers with at least 500 IP. And his 0.67 HR/9 over the same span follows suit, ranking second to the San Francisco Giants’ Logan Webb.
So if Yankee Stadium fit Soto like a glove, the team went out and found Fried to turn that glove inside out. Most importantly, Fried reflects the Yankees’ craving for confidence. He’s unlikely to threaten 200 innings, but his 2024 ERA was simultaneously 28% better than the park-adjusted MLB average and Fried’s worst showing since 2019.
Unlike the relative gamble on Carlos Rodon two offseasons ago, Fried appears to be as known a commodity as a pitcher can be heading into 2025 and beyond. About to turn 31, his skill set has historically aged well up to a point. Not overly reliant on high-octane velocity, it’s not difficult to envision Fried emulating the productive 30s of a Zack Greinke or Sonny Gray.
The new hope for the Red Sox stokes excitement precisely because his abilities aren’t yet fully defined.
Originally used as a reliever in the pros, Crochet vaulted directly from college to the majors under the strange circumstances of the pandemic season and the needs of the White Sox at the time. Chicago’s fortunes wilted as he recovered from Tommy John surgery thereafter, but the 25-year-old lefty’s transition to the starting rotation was the very best thing about a very bad 2024 club.
Crochet’s first 32 starts served as eye-opening proof of concept, resulting in a 65 raw value- that ranked 10th among pitchers with at least 100 innings. Acquired from the White Sox for a prospect package that included catcher Kyle Teel and recent first-round outfielder Braden Montgomery, Crochet was appealing enough to consolidate talent into one premium player.
His timeline (through 2026, if no extension is agreed upon) lines up with the expected surge of prospects reaching Fenway Park, and his profile in that first taste of the rotation smacked of a Cy Young contender.
Why? Because he possesses one of the pitching world’s most thrilling superpowers: missing bats with fastballs. Harnessing a four-seamer that averages 97 mph and touches triple digits, Crochet fired it in the strike zone 54% of the time and got a whiff on 24% of the resulting in-zone swings – the second-best rate in MLB on a fastball thrown at least 1,000 times. As part of the shift to starting, Crochet added a 92 mph cutter as his primary method of keeping hitters off the four-seam.
In the cat-and-mouse game, Crochet’s ability to consistently achieve positive results without leaning on more scattershot offspeed offerings meant the hitters were the mice, and there was no trap needed. He struck out 35.1% of batters and walked only 5.5%. The differential between them, a 29.6 K-BB%, is a handy metric of dominance, and Crochet led all 100-inning pitchers by almost three points. It was a top-10 season in that stat over the past decade, mirroring Spencer Strider’s breakout 2022.
The Red Sox, under second-year Chief Baseball Officer Craig Breslow, figure to tinker with Crochet’s arsenal to search for even more potential. For all the excellence, Crochet gave up a lot of loud contact on that cutter. Both pitcher and team hinted at an appetite for some changes that could give him more wiggle room when bats do connect. Watch for Crochet to commit to a sinker that he dabbled with late in 2024. It could be a nice, deceptive match for his best breaking pitch, a frisbee sweeper that will undoubtedly remind Boston fans of their last headline-making import from the South Side of Chicago: Chris Sale.
If Crochet stays relatively healthy with a heavier workload, the immense possible reward for this trade’s risk is hard to miss. There just aren’t many pitchers in the world capable of maintaining closer level ratios while working multiple times through the lineup, especially from the left side. His forebears are easy to visualize. They are the reigning Cy Young winners.
There’s more to be done before these teams can distinguish themselves from their divisional competition. The Baltimore Orioles are at risk of losing ace Corbin Burnes after one excellent season, just as the Yankees lost Soto, but their young core of hitters will likely improve upon its 2024 showing.
All reports indicate the Toronto Blue Jays are aiming to make a splash… even if they have a free-agent strikeout rate that would make Joey Gallo blush. And the Tampa Bay Rays believe themselves to be so flush with promising pitchers they traded one away to the Athletics.
What these moves represent is visible motivation, which hasn’t always been beyond the shadow of doubt in recent years. The Yankees have thrown the latest punch by flipping Nestor Cortes Jr. and second base prospect Caleb Durbin to the Brewers for Williams, a closer of such a caliber his indomitable changeup has its own nickname.
They still need to answer the pesky question, “Judge and who?” with a presence significant enough to make pitchers think about something other than the relief they feel that Soto resides across town.
Boston would do well to follow with another swing to further bolster a rotation whose cool strategic trick seemed to become demystified as 2024 wore on. They could also stand to upgrade the lineup behind exhilarating outfielder Jarren Duran and stalwart slugger Rafael Devers, perhaps in a free agent market that offers plenty of the right-handed pop they need.
Fried and Crochet are statements of intent – not as emphatic as reeling in Soto would have been – but telling nonetheless.
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