Max Fried Goes to Yankees for 8 Years, $218 Million

I know everyone wants the Cubs to be big players in free agency, but some of these deals for pitchers would have me running the other direction even if I had carte blanche to spend some billionaire’s money. Max Fried was being connected to the North Siders quite a bit in the early going of the offseason and some still believed there was a chance even though all conventional logic suggested otherwise. Sure enough, he joined the Yankees on an eight-year, $218 million deal that is pending a physical.

There’s no way in hell Jed Hoyer would have come anywhere near that deal, and I can’t say I blame him. The same will probably be true for Corbin Burnes, who must be salivating after seeing what Fried got. My only concern is that these prices will push more teams into the trade market, which appears to be gaining attractiveness even for would-be contenders who feel they could extract much higher prices than usual for their controllable starters.

Fun times.