Tampa Bay Rays (1) at New York Yankees (4), 8:00 PM ET

TBR: Nick Martínez (15-6, 3.10 ERA, 116 DRA-)
NYY: Max Fried (5-5, 2.80 ERA, 79 DRA-)

This is the first season of Martínez’s MLB lengthy career in which he hasn’t made a single appearance out of the bullpen. His distribution of outings throughout his nine years in the majors is fascinating: 160 games as a starter, 151 in relief, 34 games finished, two completed, nine saves, and a near even 63-65 record for his career, all with a four-year NPB stint parked neatly in the middle of his pro career. For years, Martínez was just good enough for a team to start at times, but not quite dominant enough—and too valuable as a bulk reliever—for anyone to commit to him full-time.

Until this year, that is. Martínez set career-highs for innings pitched in 2026, had the lowest walk rate among qualifiers, and carried a sub-2.00 ERA into June. He also, as expected, regressed to normality the rest of the way. DRA- isn’t enamored with him; Martínez is a flyball pitcher who sits at 92 mph and whose strikeout rate has plunged in recent years. (It reached a suspiciously low 15.1% in 2026.) It’s hard to make a living in the majors without striking out a lot of people. The fact that Martínez manages just that while also not excelling at home run prevention speaks to how excellent his command is.

Speaking of command, that is—unsurprisingly—the name of the game for Martínez: sterling command of a variety of pitches. Unlike many crafty pitchers without big stuff, however, Martínez doesn’t throw seventeen different breaking ball shapes, instead relying on the classic fastball trio and complementing them with his fantastic parachute changeup. Martínez will throw two-seamers, four-seamers and cutters, all three to both lefties and righties. He’s particularly good at using his two-seamer to go front-door for called strikes against lefties. Glove side is for his cutters; four-seamers are a chase pitch up and out of the zone. He will also mix in occasional curveballs and/or sliders.

Martínez faced the Yankees barely two weeks ago during a doubleheader and pitched quite well, despite taking a hard-luck loss. He kept his changeup in his pocket for the first handful of innings in that game, but don’t expect him to do the same here, because he probably won’t face 24 batters and throw 94 pitches—if Freddy Peralta at 97 mph was only allowed to face 18 batters, Martínez might not even get to that point.

Max Fried, on the other hand, will almost certainly get a chance to see the order a third time. Free agent contracts always have the potential to go sideways, but the veteran lefty has been just about everything the Yankees could’ve asked for in his first two years in the Bronx: a consistent frontline starter good enough to finish top five in Cy Young voting over a full season. Fried is one of the most unassuming elite pitchers of his generation—maybe it’s because he doesn’t generate strikeouts at the rate of other phenoms, but his 3.01 career ERA really goes under the radar at times. He’s fit in perfectly in the Bronx and is grossly overqualified as New York’s no. 2 starter.

I should also note that Fried is one of my favorite pitchers to watch. He can throw hard for a lefty, but the way he finds success always lies in a combination of his quality command and completely outlier talent for spin. This manifests in Fried’s exceptional curveball, one of the few 74-mph curves in the majors today that can reasonably lay claim to being a true finisher, and one that righties will see frequently. It also shows in his incredibly varied slider looks, of which lefties see a lot, and in his true cut fastball, which he uses to jam righties inside with tremendous success.

Fried is more platoon-oriented in his usage than Martínez: lefties get a very heavy dose of bowling-ball sinkers and sliders, righties a more varied mix that includes plenty of changeups. Both hands will see four-seam fastballs at the top of the zone to change eye levels. But Fried’s true game lies in his east-west style; when he’s locating fastballs moving in on the inner third with precision, the outer half of the plate opens up and he becomes a nightmare to handle. The Rays, with the contact-heavy approach, present a unique stylistic challenge in what will be the second meeting between team and pitcher over the last two weeks. In their last face-off, Fried dominated the Rays for six innings before things unraveled in the seventh—he got a bunch of ground balls in that one. Considering the circus that was the Yankee infield in Game Two, that would make me nervous if I were rooting for them.

Finally, an incredibly interesting part of Fried’s matchup against the Rays is how the running game will develop, if it unfolds at all. Tampa likes to run, but the remarkably athletic Fried is arguably the best fielding pitcher in the world and one of the very best at keeping runners in check: he ‘s allowed only 48 stolen bases in his entire career (and on a poor success rate) against a whopping 37 pickoffs. If Chandler Simpson gets on base, the staredown between him and Fried will rival old Western movies.