Yankees' Max Fried 'bummed' by bone bruise, but IL stint comes with silver lining

Gary Phillips, New York Daily News on May 15, 2026

Published in Baseball

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NEW YORK — The Yankees will be without their ace for at least a little while.

The team placed Max Fried on the 15-day injured list with a bone bruise in his left elbow on Friday. The decision follows the southpaw’s early exit from Wednesday’s loss to the Orioles, as well as a CT scan, an MRI and an examination from team physician Dr. Chris Ahmad, which all took place Thursday.

Dr. Neal ElAttrache will also review Thursday’s imaging imminently, manager Aaron Boone said, and Fried will undergo more tests in a few weeks or whenever he feels asymptomatic.

While losing Fried is certainly a blow for the Bombers, the good news is that the former Tommy John patient’s ulnar collateral ligament is intact. The three-time All-Star doesn’t need an operation, either.

“Definitely bummed that I’m gonna have to be missing some time, but overall happy that it doesn’t look like it’s gonna be anything serious,” Fried said before the start of the Subway Series on Friday. “No surgery required or anything like that. So I never want to go on the IL and miss games, but I also understand that the long-term outlook still looks good.”

With Fried adding that the additional imaging is just a matter of “due diligence” and that he’s “optimistic,” Boone also focused on the silver lining.

“In some ways, it’s good news in that the ligament’s in good shape,” the manager said. “It’s just a matter of how the timeline is going to shake out. But long-term, I feel like we’re in an OK spot.”

Speaking of timelines, Fried said his is “ambiguous,” and he didn’t want to set any kind of expectations for when he could return to throwing or game action. He said there’s a “wide range of recovery,” and he doesn’t want to push himself too far “because then it can get pretty bad.”

“With a bone bruise, if you keep throwing through it, it weakens the bone, and then that bone will break or fracture,” he explained. “Then you would probably need surgery or something like that.”

Fried added, “I’m going to do whatever I can to get back as soon as possible. I don’t like being hurt and not pitching.”

Fried’s bone bruise did not occur due to any sort of contact, but because the hyperextension of his arm and elbow resulted in “the banging of the two bones back there,” he said. That left his elbow “irritated” and “pissed” in his last start.

Fried also felt some discomfort in the days leading up to that game and in “numerous starts” this season, though the issue previously subsided faster than it did Wednesday, when the pitcher had a tough time loosening up and reaching max velocity in each of the three innings that he threw.

Fried said he felt sore Friday, but that his elbow is “definitely getting better.” The discomfort is more “intense” when he’s throwing, but he feels it whenever he fully extends his arm.

Fried, in his second season with the Yankees after signing an eight-year, $218 million deal two winters ago, said he has “no worries” about his injury long-term. He’s going to use his downtime to work on his mechanics and timing on the mound in hopes of making sure this doesn’t become a reoccurring issue.

The Yankees, meanwhile, had yet to finalize their rotation plans prior to Friday’s game, Boone said, nor had they announced a corresponding move for Fried.

Pitching prospect Elmer Rodríguez, who made his first two big league starts earlier this season, makes the most sense as Fried’s rotation replacement until Gerrit Cole is ready to return from Tommy John surgery.

Accelerating Cole’s timeline is not in the cards. Boone said it’s “likely” the Cy Young winner makes two more rehab starts, starting with one at Triple-A on Saturday.

“It’s just wanting to build him correctly and safely,” Boone said when asked why the Yankees don’t want to move Cole along faster. “We just want to be disciplined coming off of, obviously, a serious injury where he missed a lot of time. We want that build to be a steady one and one that puts him in the best position to come back and have a lot of success up here.”