Major League Baseball's 2025 international signing period concluded on Monday. The New York Yankees signed over 30 prospects to amateur contracts.
They kept active until the final day of the signing period, agreeing to a $90,000 pact with 18-year-old Duth left-hander Tijn Fredrikze. The contract was first reported by Honkbal Softbal's Seb Visser.
"At 18, several scouts believe he has a chance to develop his velocity (88–91 MPH) and secondary pitches," international baseball reporter Francys Romero wrote on X (formerly Twitter) about Fredrikze's future with the Yankees.
The Yankees scouted Fredrikze extensively
At just 18, it's going to take some time for Fredrikze to develop his pitching arsenal and grow stronger before he reaches the Major Leagues.
But the Yankees liked what they saw from him earlier this year.
“They’d been following me for a while and really saw the progress I’d made,” Fredrikze told Honkbal Softbal, translated from Dutch to English. “You often see clubs approach the player right away. But the Yankees politely approached my parents first. That felt very professional. It really gave me the feeling that they were investing in me, not just as a player but also as a person.”
The Yankees fired their longtime international scouting director, Donny Rowland, in November.
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