Gerrit Cole evaluates shortest inning of his career

Gerrit Cole struggled to find the words to describe his performance to members of the media at his locker in the visiting clubhouse at Comerica Park on Tuesday night.

The Yankees’ ace had been removed from the game after only 1.2 innings pitched his shortest start in the majors.

The Yankees went on to win the game, aided by 7.1 shutout innings from the bullpen, but Cole’s displeasure remained.

“This game is obviously pretty disappointing,” Cole told reporters.

Cole completely lost control of the strike zone in the second inning after striking out the side in the first.

Cole faced seven batters in the first inning, starting with a base hit up the middle by Miguel Cabrera. He walked four batters while throwing 46 pitches in a single inning, the most he’s ever thrown in a single inning.

In that inning, Detroit scored two earned runs. With the bases loaded, Cole walked in a run, and Willi Castro was out following an 11-pitch at-bat. The other came on Robbie Grossman’s sacrifice fly.

Asked what was going through his mind when he saw manager Aaron Boone emerge from the first-base dugout, calling to the bullpen, Cole said “four letter words.”

"Still going through the evaluation process a bit, but just not on the plate enough really. Not able to get leverage and keep leverage." – Gerrit Cole goes over his start vs. Detroit. pic.twitter.com/2YoktSiXml

— YES Network (@YESNetwork) April 20, 2022

Cole was looking forward to pitching in his third start of the season, having stated earlier in the week that he was ready to build on his prior outings and was ready to pitch later in the game with a lower pitch total. Cole had yet to throw more than 85 pitches in a game this season after a short spring.

Cole, on the other hand, only threw 68 pitches. It wasn’t due to a lack of pitch count. It was due to his inability to keep hitters off the board.

“I think he just lost the strike zone a little bit,” Boone said after the 4-2 victory. “Probably got a little bit out of his rhythm. Thought he was pretty sharp actually in the first inning and then the Willi Castro at-bat where he actually got ahead of them and started spoiling a lot of pitches and then eventually lost him. Was just missing around the zone a little bit and then started spraying his fastball a little bit.”

Cole threw only 37 strikes out of 68 pitches. He had the most walks in a single start in his career with five.

Boone went on to say that he thought he had left his ace in the game for much too long. Cole retorted that he’ll always pitch as long as he can in a game. He did confess, however, that his legs were shaking before Boone came out to fetch him in the second inning on a cold night in a long game.