Was Yankees' Gerrit Cole's postseason resume the difference in deciding the ALDS Game 1 starter?
Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake watches as pitcher Gerrit Cole throws a bullpen session at Tropicana Field on Friday in St. Petersburg, Fla. Credit: Newsday/William Perlman
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — One measure of just how good the Yankees' rotation has been this season (and now two games into the postseason) is this oddity:
By choosing to go with Gerrit Cole in American League Division Series Game 1 against the Rays on Saturday night, the Yankees actually left themselves open to second-guessing.
Not all that much, but some.
It was not a surprising announcement and one, considering Cole’s resume, that was somewhat expected.
It was one thing to tell Cole, the ace of pretty much every rotation he’s been a part of, that Cam Schlittler would start Game 1 of the Wild Card Series against the Red Sox.
Schlittler, the presumed American League Cy Young Award winner after going 14-6 with a league-low 1.95 ERA, had one of the best seasons any Yankees pitcher has ever had.
Cole himself would have tabbed Schlittler to start Game 1 against the Red Sox (the Yankees did debate starting Max Fried in Game 1 against Boston but ultimately chose not to outthink themselves and went with the no-brainer decision to start Schlittler).
But telling Cole, who is 11-6 with a 2.77 ERA in 22 career postseason starts — including getting the nod in eight Game 1s — that he would be bypassed for this one even in favor of the red-hot-down-the-stretch Carlos Rodon, might have been dicey.
Based on late-season accomplishment, Rodon certainly belonged in the discussion. As manager Aaron Boone put it Friday before his team worked out at Tropicana Field, Rodon wasn’t merely in play for ALDS Game 1.
“Carlos has been a consideration, literally, [for] Game 1 of the Wild Card, 2 of the Wild Card, potentially Game 3, and every game moving forward,” said Boone, who added that Rodon will start either Game 3 or 4 of this series. “So it's one of those difficult decisions we have, one of those good difficult decisions we have, because we have four guys that are very high-end. So it's at least a conversation every time.”
Rodon put himself in the conversation with his work during the last month-plus. The lefthander, who had two separate stints on the injured list, went 7-3 with a 2.67 ERA in 16 starts and was particularly good late, pitching better than anyone in the rotation not named Schlittler with a 3-1 record and a 1.89 ERA in his final seven starts.
Cole, meanwhile, wasn’t nearly as good as the season drew to a close. He went 10-9 with a 3.61 ERA in 22 starts after beginning the year on the IL while recovering from Tommy John surgery, but in his last seven starts, he went 4-3 with a 4.46 ERA, allowing 11 homers in 40 1/3 innings. He allowed seven home runs in a span of 9 1⁄3 innings against the Padres and Mets and then gave up another one against the Diamondbacks, making it eight in a 13-inning span.
Looking at each pitcher’s last start of the season against the Rays also boosted Rodon’s candidacy for Game 1 of this series.
Facing the Rays on Sept. 22 in the first game of a doubleheader with the Yankees still mathematically alive for the AL East title, Rodon produced perhaps his best outing of the season in a 2-0 victory, allowing three hits in a season-high eight innings.
“One of the best-pitched games I saw all year,” one rival scout said that day.
Facing the Rays in a game without meaning a day later — Tampa Bay had clinched the division title by winning the second game of the Sept. 22 doubleheader — Cole allowed two runs and three hits, including a home run, in 5 2/3 innings of a 9-2 victory. He walked three and struck out eight.
“I thought Carlos really, really pitched well down the stretch,” Cole said on Friday.
But the Yankees weighed more than the stretch run.
The pitchers’ respective postseason resumes don’t compare, for one. Cole has been good far more often than not in his 22 starts, 12 of those with the Yankees, for whom he’s gone 5-2 with a 2.93 ERA. Rodon has been the opposite, 1-3 with a 7.53 ERA in eight games (six of those with the Yankees, going 1-2 with a 6.92 ERA).
Part of the calculus has been Cole’s relative consistency over the years against the Rays and, more significant, at Tropicana Field, where the Rays tied for MLB’s best home record at 55-26 this season.
Cole is 2-4 with a career 3.32 ERA in 10 starts at the Trop and 2-2, 3.52 in six starts as a Yankee in this quirky ballpark. Rodon hasn’t been bad in three career Tropicana Field outings, 0-1 with a 3.68 ERA, but doesn't have nearly the track record there that Cole has.
Cole didn’t throw especially well in this stadium in his one start there this season on July 8, allowing three runs and seven hits in 6 1/3 innings of a 3-0 loss.
Still, as Boone said: “I feel like he's always thrown the ball really well here. Not that that's everything.”
Though not the lone factor in swaying the Yankees, it clearly was far from an insignificant one.
Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.
