He was born and raised in the Los Angeles area. He grew up as a Dodgers fan.
Max Fried heard countless stories from his father and others about the great Dodgers left-handed pitcher of the 1960s, Sandy Koufax. As a 4-year-old kid, Fried met Reggie Smith, a former All-Star outfielder with the Dodgers and other teams, who became his mentor.
“I grew up about 25-30 minutes from Dodger Stadium, so I grew up watching the Dodgers,” Fried said Sunday. “We would go (to games) as a family … a couple of games a year, every year.”
On Monday night, in Game 1 of the National League Championship Series, Fried will be the Braves' starting pitcher against the team he cheered as a child.
Starting the Braves' first NLCS game in 19 years is momentous enough, but doing so against his hometown team may add to the magnitude of the moment for Fried, a 26-year-old left-hander.
He was born in Santa Monica, west of downtown Los Angeles, and finished high school at Harvard-Westlake School in Studio City after his nearby high school dropped its baseball program.
Although Koufax and Smith played long before Fried was born, both inspired him.
Fried said he got to know Smith, who played for the Dodgers from 1976-81, around a Little League field where Smith conducted baseball camps.
“From a young age, I was able to kind of learn .... my baseball knowledge from Reggie,” Fried said. Although Smith wasn’t a pitcher, “we started having deep conversations about pitching and setting hitters up,” Fried said. “He helped me get in the mind of the hitter – what they look for, what they don’t. Also, he’s just a really smart baseball mind, so any and every question that I have, I can always reach out to him.”
Growing up, Fried also became familiar with the legendary Koufax, whose number (32) Fried wore in high school and the minor leagues.
“Me being a left-handed pitcher … he was someone that was kind of easy to idolize,” Fried said. “You heard stories about how great a person he was, besides being as good a player as he was.”
By the time he was in high school, Fried became a fan of current Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw, who is scheduled to start Game 2 against the Braves on Tuesday.
Fried has made three career starts against the Dodgers, one in 2018 and two in 2019, compiling an 0-2 record and 6.55 ERA against them.
In his first start against the Dodgers, at Truist Park (then named SunTrust Park) in July 2018, Fried allowed one run and two hits across five innings, striking out seven. In his second start against them, at Dodger Stadium in May 2019, he allowed four runs on four hits in one-plus inning and was knocked out of the game when his left hand was struck by a second-inning line drive. And in his most recent start against the Dodgers, in August 2019 at Truist, he allowed three runs on eight hits in five innings, striking out eight.
Fried also made four brief relief appearances against the Dodgers in a 2018 Division Series. He allowed one hit and one run across 2-1/3 innings in those outings as the Dodgers won the best-of-five series in four games. Perhaps more memorably, Fried met Koufax before the opener of that series.
“(That was) the first time I pitched at Dodger Stadium," Fried said. "It was cool to be able to throw in front of friends and family.”
This season, Fried posted a 7-0 record with a 2.25 ERA across 56 innings and was considered a Cy Young Award candidate until he was sidelined by back and ankle injuries in September. The NLCS opener will be his third start of this postseason.
He pitched seven scoreless innings in Game 1 of the first-round series against Cincinnati, but struggled in Game 1 of the Division Series against Miami, lasting just four innings and allowing four runs on six hits. Against the Dodgers, Fried will face a demonstrably stronger lineup than the Reds or Marlins presented.
“I can’t wait to get back out there, honestly,” Fried said.
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