On Thursday, Gerrit Cole suffered his first setback as a member of the New York Yankees.
After two great spring starts to begin his New York career, Cole was shelled in a 15-11 loss to the Tigers on the road in Lakeland. He was expected to pitch three innings but wound up pitching just two. He gave up six runs and six hits. Four of those six hits left the yard. Travis Demeritte was responsible for two of them, and old friend Miguel Cabrera was responsible for the other two.
The crazy thing is that the two hit the home runs back-to-back, twice!
No Need To Worry
Despite a rough outing, there’s absolutely no reason to worry about Cole. It’s just Spring Training, and that means nothing for the regular season.
Cole also told Bryan Hoch of MLB.com that he was dealing with a fever the past few days and thought it might have been strep. He also told Hoch that he was working on sequences and would have gone at batters in a more aggressive matter if it was a regular-season game.
“I’ve had outings like this before. I guess it’s good it happened here,” said Cole to Hoch after the game.
He’s not dealing with injuries, and hopefully, his sickness will just get better with rest. That could have been a contributing factor to his disappointing start.
Since he’s been going on regular rest, Cole will likely return to the hill for Tuesday’s game against the Blue Jays at home in Tampa.