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Max Fried

Max Fried World Series Ring

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Max Fried has won one world series ring as the Atlanta Braves in the 2021 season.

Early Career

Drafted in 2012 by the San Diego Padres in the first round, seventh overall,

Max Fried made his major league debut in 2017. His 17 wins in 2019 were 2nd-most in the National League, and his seven wins in 2020 were again 2nd-most in the NL.

Through 2021, Fried was second in win–loss percentage of Braves career leaders, at .690.

Fried pitched 6 shut-out innings in the final game of the 2021 World Series against the Houston Astros, helping lead the Braves to their first World Series title in 26 years.

While in 2020, Fried won the NL Gold Glove Award at pitcher and the Fielding Bible Award at pitcher.

Furthermore in 2021, he won the Gold Glove Award again, as well as Silver Slugger Award for pitchers.

Becoming the third pitcher in MLB history to win both awards in the same year.

He was also named to the All-MLB Team of those two years.

Max Fried Winning World Series Game
Max Fried winning World Series Game

Max Fried Atlanta Braves 2017 to present

Fried was called up to the Atlanta Braves on August 5, 2017.

He debuted on August 8, throwing two scoreless innings against the Philadelphia Phillies.

This displaying what David O’Brien of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution called “a devastating curveball”.

Also, two weeks later, Max Fried returned to the minor leagues, joining the AAA Gwinnett Braves.

Making 26 innings pitched for the Atlanta Braves for the season, he was 1–1 with a 3.81 ERA.

At the end of the 2017 season, Fried joined the Peoria Javelinas of the Arizona Fall League, for whom he was named league Player of the Week on October 31.

Leading the league with 32 strikeouts in 26 innings (3rd in the league), and was 3–1 with a 1.73 ERA (6th in the league) in six starts.

Furthermore, he ranked first among starters with a .163 opponents’ average, was second in fewest-baserunners-allowed-per-nine-innings.

Adding to that, Max Fried was named to the AFL’s Top Prospects Team.

Also, baseball America rated him # 3 on the AFL Hot Sheet.

While in December, Braves manager Brian Snitker said that he might look at Fried, Lucas Sims, or another pitcher as the team’s fifth starter in 2018.

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2020: Undefeated, Gold Glove and Fielding Bible Awards, All-MLB First Team

Going into 2020, Freddie Freeman predicted that Fried would be: “phenomenal, better than last year.”

During the season Fried developed into the ace starting pitcher for the Braves.

His four pickoffs through September 6 were the most in the majors in 2020, and he needed only 12 pickoff attempts to do so.

Since his major league debut in 2017, Max Fried’s 14 pickoffs were the most in the majors, and he was successful on 19% of his attempts.

In that same time-span, pitchers in all of baseball had been successful in picking off runners in only 0.017% of attempts.

Fried started the season by becoming the first left-handed pitcher to not allow any home runs through eight starts, with his team winning every game, since Babe Ruth in 1917.

In the pandemic-shortened 2020 regular season, Fried was a perfect 7–0 with a 2.25 ERA and a 1.09 WHIP.

He led the major leagues in won-loss percentage (1.000) and pickoffs (4), led the National League in WAR for pitchers (2.9), was 2nd in the NL in Wins Above Replacement-all behind Mookie Betts, and tied for 2nd in the NL in wins.

On defense, Max Fried led all major league pitchers in assists for the second consecutive season (with 15), tied for the MLB lead in pickoffs.

With 4; with his 9 in 2019–20 he was tops in major league baseball, and led all pitchers with five Defensive Runs Saved.

Fried won the 2020 NL Gold Glove Award at pitcher.

He became the fourth Braves pitcher to win the award, joining Mike Hampton, Greg Maddux, and Phil Niekro, and the first Braves player to win the award for a pitcher in 17 years.

He also won the 2020 Fielding Bible Award at pitcher.

The award honors the top fielder in the Major Leagues at pitcher.

This led him came in fifth in voting for the 2020 NL Cy Young Award.

On top of that, he was named a starter on the 2020 All-MLB First Team.

Max Fried Showing Off His World Series Ring During Ring Ceremony
Max Fried Showing off his World Series Ring During ring ceremony

Winning the 2021 Atlanta Braves World Series Ring

Fried was the Braves’ 2021 Opening Day starting pitcher.

His first career complete game shutout was a Maddux, pitched against the Baltimore Orioles on August 20, 2021.

Max Fried threw a second Maddux on September 24, while facing the San Diego Padres.

His 1.76 ERA and 0.84 WHIP in the second half of the season were the best in the major leagues.

Therefore, he was named the National League Pitcher of the Month for September, after posting a 1.54 ERA.

In the 2021 regular season, Max Fried was 14–7 with a 3.04 ERA (9th in the National League), and his 14 wins were 5th in the NL.

In 28 starts he threw 2 shutouts (leading the league),

Also, in 165.2 innings he averaged 7.5 hits, 0.8 home runs (3rd), and 2.2 walks per 9 innings, for a 1.087 WHIP.

His 8.584 strikeouts/9 innings were the 11th-most in Braves history.

Not to forget his 51.8% ground ball percentage was 3rd-highest in the NL, and he induced softly hit balls 20.0% of the time (5th).

As a batter, he hit .273/.322/.327. His batting average and on-base percentage led all pitchers.

While his slugging percentage ranked second. He scored 7 runs (2nd), hit three doubles (2nd), and drove in 5 RBIs (6th) in 55 at bats, had the second-highest exit velocity of all pitchers (90.3 mph), had 8 sacrifice hits (8th of all players), and was called upon to pinch hit four times.

Atlanta Braves World Series Ring
Atlanta Braves World Series Ring

On defense, Max Fried led the league in range factor/game as a pitcher (1.61), in assists as a pitcher for the third consecutive season (37), and in Defensive Runs Saved for the third season in a row.

For the second consecutive season he tied for the major league lead in pickoffs (6).

In the three years in which Fried was a starter, from 2019–21, he led all National League pitchers in wins (38), was tied for the lead in shutouts (2), was 2nd in the vertical movement

of his curveball (−11.6 inches; batters hit .183/.218/.294 against it), and had the third-lowest barrels percentage in balls hit against him (5.0%). In those three years on offense he led NL pitchers in runs (18), doubles (7).

On base percentage (.292), and WAR (1.3), was 2nd-lowest in strikeout percentage (25.8%), and third in batting average (.234), slugging percentage (.297), OPS (.589), and walks (9). In those three years.

While on defense, he led all NL pitchers in assists (86).

Fried won the final game of the 2021 World Series ring with six shutout innings against the Houston Astros, who had led the majors in batting average and runs for the season, with Houston’s three-time batting champion Jose Altuve observing: “He was almost unhittable.

Above all, this was the first World Series ring won by Max Fried and the first world series ring won by the Atlanta Braves since 1995.”

Fried won the 2021 NL Gold Glove Award at pitcher, winning the award for the second year in a row.

He became the third Braves pitcher to win multiple Gold Glove Awards, joining Greg Maddux and Phil Niekro.

Max Fried was named a starter on the 2021 All-MLB Second Team, earning his second consecutive All-MLB selection.

Through 2021, of the Braves career leaders, Fried was second in win–loss percentage (.690; behind Russ Ortiz and ahead of Greg Maddux).