Gerrit Cole seems to be back in form in New York.
The Yankees ace pitched six scoreless innings in the regular-season finale against the Guardians in the Bronx on Thursday afternoon, earning his 150th career win and becoming just the fourth active MLB player to do so.
Cole joins the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw, the Astros’ Justin Verlander and the Rangers’ Max Scherzer in accomplishing the feat in the midst of an individual season that lacked the magic that led to his AL Cy Young Award-winning campaign last year.
“It’s a special number,” Cole said after the game. “I’m really happy about it and even more happy because I played well today.”
Cole missed the first 2 1/2 months of the season with neuritis and swelling in his pitching elbow, struggled to return to the mound and even missed a rotation spot earlier this month because of fatigue, so an appearance like Thursday’s was necessary for the 33-year-old.
Despite a bit of trouble early in the top of the second inning, falling behind in the count (he threw one extra warm-up pitch, resulting in a pitch clock violation), Cole shook it off and allowed just one hit through the sixth inning.
The infraction, called by home plate umpire Derek Thomas, infuriated Cole and manager Aaron Boone.
They argued there should have been a grace period after catcher Austin Wells struck out to end the previous inning.
Wells rushed to get his gear on, and Boone said the team was effectively penalized for it, as the game started early because of Wells’ rush.
“At the end of the day, if Wells comes out of the dugout six seconds late, they’re going to ignore it,” Boone said.
The inning’s leadoff hitter, Cleveland’s JonKency Noel, was nowhere near the plate when Thomas said, “One more pitch.”
Cole got the out and started behind in the count, but eventually walked Noel.
This marks the second time this season that Cole has been called for a pitch clock violation before the start of an inning.
On July 19, in the Yankees’ 6-1 win over the Rays, he was unable to throw his final warm-up pitch until there were 20 seconds left in the game.
“He followed the letter of the law,” Cole said, “so in that sense it’s the right decision.”
Cole threw 55 strikeouts on 95 pitches and struck out two.
This moved him past Jim Palmer for 64th all-time with 2,213 strikeouts.
The only blemish on the game was the five walks he gave up, a career-high.
The Yankees benefited greatly from Cole’s historic dominance over the Guardians in their final series against Cleveland.
Cole is 11-2 with a 2.59 ERA against Cleveland during his 12-year MLB career and 4-0 (1.98 ERA) in the postseason with the Yankees and Astros.
It’s been a good month for Cole, as he has allowed just one run in his last three starts and just three runs in his last 23 innings.
“[One-hundred-fifty] “Three wins in the major leagues is a pretty impressive number,” Boone said. “Hall of Fame worthy. I feel like we pitched really well as a team after Day 1 in Chicago. We’ve had a couple of tough losses where we were pitching well, but today was even better. All four of us were really in control today.”
