DETROIT — Gerrit Cole walked off the Comerica Park mound with a blank expression, handed the ball to Aaron Boone, and headed for the visitors’ dugout. He was leaving far sooner than anyone in a Yankees uniform wanted.
The line was ugly. Five runs. Nine hits. Just 4 1/3 innings. It was the roughest start Cole has had since returning from Tommy John surgery, and it fueled a 5-3 New York loss to the Detroit Tigers on Monday night.
Yet the night carried a twist that complicates the easy story. The radar gun never dropped. The velocity was there. The stuff, by both Cole’s read and his manager’s, was largely fine. The results simply were not.
That gap between how Cole threw and how he was hit is the real story coming out of Detroit.
The stuff held, the execution did not
Cole had defied the usual Tommy John timeline through his first five starts. He brought a 2.57 ERA into the night and had mostly looked like the pitcher who won the 2023 AL Cy Young Award.
Monday broke that run. After two clean innings and a 1-0 lead, his outing turned sideways.
Cole pointed to three specific pitches that landed over the middle of the plate. The velocity on them was not the problem. The location was.
A 96.4-mph four-seam fastball to Spencer Torkelson leading off the second became a double into the left-center gap. Cole struck out the next three hitters after it. A 97.6-mph four-seamer to Colt Keith in the third turned into a two-out RBI single that capped a three-run inning and a 3-1 Detroit lead. An 89.4-mph changeup to Riley Greene in the fifth was crushed 422 feet to right-center for a 5-1 lead.
Three mistakes over the heart of the zone, all at full velocity, all punished.
Cole and Boone read the same tape
Cole did not search for a complicated explanation afterward. He kept it short and direct.
“I don’t know,” said Cole. “I sure made a handful of mistakes there. … But they hit a good amount of good pitches.”
Many pitchers say it takes a full two years removed from Tommy John surgery before they feel like their old selves. Cole was asked whether his recovery played a role in the rough outing. He rejected the idea and pointed at his own command instead.
“I don’t think it has anything to do with that,” Cole said. “The reality is, pitches over the heart of the plate, there’s three.”
Boone watched the same outing and reached the same conclusion. He felt Cole’s stuff was good overall and traced the damage to a handful of fastballs that drifted.
“They didn’t really miss,” Boone said. “When he missed, or was a little off with the fastball, they were able to square it up. “I think he looks good. The stuff’s there. It always comes down to how good you execute time in and time out, and for the most part he’s been very good…..They took advantage of some pitches that probably leaked into the heart of the plate on him today and put up some points on him.”
Cole’s decade-long edge on Detroit ends
The loss ended a remarkable run for Cole against the Tigers. He entered with a 10-1 record and a 1.84 ERA in 14 career starts versus Detroit. His only prior loss to them had come on April 14, 2016, when he pitched for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Tigers left-hander Framber Valdez, an old Yankees nemesis from his years with the Astros, outpitched him. Valdez allowed one run on four hits and two walks over six innings, striking out eight. He improved to 4-5. Cole fell to 2-2.
The trouble began with an unlikely source. Zack McKinstry, the Tigers’ No. 9 hitter who entered batting .177, led off the third with a triple and started the rally that put Detroit ahead for good.
New York’s offense offered little support. The Yankees had gone 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position Saturday and 0-for-13 Sunday in weekend losses to the Reds. Ali Sanchez’s second-inning RBI double snapped that skid, but the bats mostly stayed quiet again.
Yankees slide but keep AL lead
Amed Rosario provided the only late spark. He hit a two-run homer in the seventh to cut the deficit to 5-3, two pitches after Sanchez left the game when a 98-mph Drew Anderson fastball struck him on the right wrist area.
The defeat was New York’s third in a row and fourth in five games. Even with the slide, and without injured slugger Aaron Judge, the Yankees still hold the best record in the American League at 46-31.
The loss was not all on Cole. The Yankees were sloppy again, committing a catcher’s interference on Sanchez and a wild throw home from left fielder Jose Caballero in the fourth. They also ran out of ABS challenges in the sixth after Anthony Volpe used one on a strike-three call that was not particularly close.
History suggests Monday will not be the last bump for Cole. Pitchers returning from Tommy John often endure several of these nights in their first year back. The encouraging counterpoint for the Yankees is that the velocity held, which is usually the harder thing to recover.
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