Yankees aren't all too concerned about Gerrit Cole's nightmare Subway Series outing
Yankees starting pitcher Gerrit Cole reacts against the New York Mets during the first inning at Citi Field on Tuesday, June 25, 2024. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
The Yankees insisted there was no cause for concern, even if the radar gun might’ve indicated otherwise.
Yes, Gerrit Cole had a nightmare start in the Yankees' 9-7 loss to the Mets at Citi Field Tuesday. His velocity was down 1-2 mph across all his pitches - his fastball at one point dipping as low as 91.5 mph - and his location wasn’t quite making up for it, either. He allowed six runs, all earned, over four innings, walked four for the first time since April 2022, and struck out no one for the only the second time in his career. Four balls left the yard - the first time he’s done that since 2022, too. And all this happened after he missed two and a half months with nerve inflammation and edema in his pitching elbow.
But while the results were far from intentional, the reigning Cy Young award winner said the velocity dip was by design, adding “I feel really good physically…"
“It’s a bit like driving a car,” he said. “Too much clutch or too little clutch can slip you out of gear a little bit…We just weren’t in the strike zone enough and it cost us 28 pitches [in the first inning]. The objective is to try to get us as deep in the ballgame as you can.”
Cole, whose fastball averaged 96.7 mph last year, had an average fastball velocity of 96.9 mph in the first inning, and 94 mph every inning after - an attempt, he said, to better locate the pitch after a rocky first inning where he allowed a leadoff double and walked three.
Three of the four homers he allowed were on fastballs that clocked in from 91.5 mph to 93.2 mph - two to Mark Vientos and one to Harrison Bader - and the fourth came on a well-executed 88.7 mph changeup to Brandon Nimmo, who generally hits that pitch well. He threw 72 pitches, 44 for strikes.
“He was up to 97, 98 at times; you saw 99 up there on the radar,” Aaron Boone said. “It was finding that happy medium. He does that usually always…Today it fluctuated a little bit where I think he’s finding his gauge out there [where] in that first inning, [he was] coming out hot and then making them really work, just missing with some pitches. It taxed him a little and he probably dialed it back in the third and second.”
The result was an outlier in Cole’s career: It was the first time he’d allowed three homers on four-seam fastballs of under 94 mph, according to statistician Katie Sharp. The Mets hit six balls off Cole at 101.5 mph or faster.
And while one bad outing is hardly the harbinger of bad news, it remains something to keep an eye on. The Yankees have been cautious with Cole’s rehab, and Aaron Judge even said this stretch is more like his spring training. He threw 62 pitches in his first game back against the Orioles and is gradually upping his workload.
“Coming back from an injury like that - anything with the arm, you’ve got to be careful with that kind of stuff,” Judge said. “I think he was executing the location where he wanted but it wasn’t as fine as he normally does, but he’s still working back. That’s our ace, that’s our guy and I want him out there every five days…He’ll be fine.”
Cole added that being away from the game for so long led to mistakes in sequencing - a situation exacerbated by the Mets’ own quality at bats.
“Seeing the way people are reacting to the ball on a regular basis, that helps your instincts and I don’t have a lot of reps in that regard,” he said. “I was a pitch too late [with sequencing] and my execution was poor so I never really gave myself a chance to learn anything, to get a foul ball or to get a mishit…[Some of] those pitches were in relatively good areas, but the problem is that they’re ready for those pitches and those situations.”
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.