Defensive chaos sabotages Cole's gem in 1st start vs. Blue Jays in 2 years

TORONTO -- As the Yankees and Blue Jays battled for the American League East title and in the AL Division Series in 2025, New York did so with a main piece of its rotation sidelined.

That, of course, was Gerrit Cole, who spent last summer recovering from Tommy John surgery, unable to leave his mark on the intradivision rivalry.

In Friday night’s 3-1 loss at Rogers Centre, Cole and the Blue Jays renewed acquaintances for the first time since Aug. 4, 2024, with the veteran right-hander working six innings of two-run (one earned) ball with five strikeouts on 87 pitches (57 strikes).

“I thought Gerrit was good,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “I thought in the first couple innings, [he was] kind of struggling to get into a little bit of a rhythm there, but made some really big pitches, and then he really started to flow.

“His strike throwing got really good, and he ends up giving us another strong outing.”

• Boone ejected by home-plate ump after arguing strike call on García

Despite Cole delivering five scoreless innings to begin his start, things got a little weird in the sixth. Toronto pushed a pair of runs across as New York missed out on a chance to escape the frame.

With one out and runners on first and second, Cole forced George Springer to hit a ground ball to third baseman Ryan McMahon, who fielded the ball, stepped on his base and threw to first with a chance at keeping the Yankees’ 1-0 lead.

McMahon’s throw was too low for first baseman Luis García Jr. to dig out, however, allowing Springer to reach.

To make matters worse, García’s glove came off before he grabbed the loose ball, spun and threw back to third, where shortstop George Lombard Jr. was in the area but unable to corral the errant toss, bringing Vladimir Guerrero Jr. in to score.

“It’s a key play of the game right there,” García said through translator Marlon Abreu. “Trying to execute a double play, get out of the inning. Trying to [make] a pick there at first base, and I couldn’t do that there in the moment.

“At the same time, I’m seeing Vladdy running, being aggressive, and now the focus is to make a good throw and get him out. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out the way we wanted.”

Alejandro Kirk, who later homered in the eighth, then doubled to score Springer as the go-ahead run, putting the microscope on the pair of errors and adding an unearned run to Cole’s line.

“I think [García] just got overly aggressive with throwing to third there, especially with a two-out situation,” Boone said. “But when his back got to the play, when he turned around and got his sightline again … he obviously should have held it.”

It brought an end to the night for Cole, who finished with five hits and two walks against, and put a close to his individual three-game win streak.

“I certainly would have liked to maybe dictate a couple of those at-bats a little bit better,” Cole said of the decisive sixth. “But when it was all said and done, we executed the pitches that we wanted, and unfortunately, they were able to continue to find holes.”

The evening got off to a solid start for Cole, who worked around some trouble in the second inning -- stranding runners at second and third -- before settling in to retire the next nine batters he faced.

Cole attacked Blue Jays hitters with fastballs early and often -- furthering a recent trend that has seen him throwing more heaters -- using the pitch 64% of the time while also selectively mixing in his slider, knuckle-curve and changeup.

While perhaps it didn’t reach the heights of his previous few outings, Friday built on a string of quality starts for the 2023 AL Cy Young Award winner. Over Cole’s past eight appearances, he has pitched to a 2.57 ERA while racking up 58 strikeouts over 49 innings.

Although the defensive miscues in the sixth will stand out, New York’s bats didn’t give their pitching staff much support once again in Friday’s loss, continuing a collective second-half slump.

“Obviously, this continues to be a challenge for us,” Boone said. “This is another night where I thought we made decent contact, and we're having some of the right at-bats. But at the end of the day, we got to push runs across when we get opportunities because that's where we've struggled, and we got to make it happen.”