The New York Yankees paid Gerrit Cole $324 million in the 2019 offseason to be their ace and win high stakes games, especially in the postseason.
But Tuesday’s American League Wild Card game was an absolute disaster for the Yankees ace.
Cole recorded just six outs and was pulled from the game with two on and nobody out in the third inning with the Yankees trailing 3-0 in the win-or-go home playoff game.
It was the shortest playoff outing of his career and matched the shortest of any game in his career.
The right-hander had run into trouble in the first inning. After he retired the first two batters of the game, he walked Rafael Devers and allowed a two-run home run to Xander Bogaerts.
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After striking out the side in the second inning — which also consisted of a Kevin Plawecki double — Cole returned to the mound in the top of the third and allowed a leadoff home run to Kyle Schwarber to put the Yankees in a 3-0 hole.
He allowed a single and a walk before Aaron Boone had seen enough and decided to pull him from the game.
As Boone went to the mound, Cole could be seen uttering, “I’m out. I’m out.”
Cole has not looked sharp at all in his recent starts since being pulled from a game with a hamstring issue, but during a mid-game interview, Boone said that Cole was not dealing with any sort of injury.
Naturally, the fans at Fenway had fun taunting the Yankees’ supposed ace as he left the game.
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