Gerrit Cole pitches 7 innings in Yankees’ 2024 ALDS win

But for a brief moment, it looked as if Cole’s 87th – and final – pitch of the night would send Kauffman Stadium into a state of delirium.

Kyle Isbel smashed the ball 370 feet to his right, according to Statcast. It looked like it was enough to get out of the yard for a game-winning two-run home run.

Instead, right fielder Juan Soto drifted back and caught the ball inches short of the Royals’ bullpen fence. According to Statcast, Isbel’s drive would have disappeared in 24 of the 30 MLB parks – including Yankee Stadium.

But not this evening at Kauffman Stadium and not against Cole, who will likely make his next start in Game 2 of the AL Championship Series on Tuesday at Yankee Stadium against the Guardians or Tigers.

“My heart skipped a beat at Isbel,” admitted Yankees manager Aaron Boone.

If Cole was upset about the fly ball as it went right, he wouldn’t let on in the postgame euphoria.

“I implemented my pitch. As a pitcher, that’s all you can do,” Cole said.

When the ball landed safely in Soto’s glove, Cole let out a mighty roar as he headed back to the dugout.

“He was electric tonight,” said Jazz Chisholm Jr., the Yankees’ third baseman and odds machine. “I don’t know if you saw the roar in his last inning, but that got everyone excited.” Gerrit, he’s the ace I’ve never seen in my life, the confidence, the way he going out there and carrying this team and telling everyone to stick with it.”

Cole spread six hits and one run across his seven frames, failing to score a single hit and striking out four. In 19 career postseason starts, Cole improved to 11-6 while lowering his ERA to 2.94.

“I thought Gerrit was great,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “Really efficient again. I thought from the jump that his fastball was really good and he controlled it, and then he was able to mix other things with it.”

After a poor performance in his team’s 6-5 win in Game 1, Cole was thrilled to bounce back with a classic effort.

“It means a lot,” Cole said. “It was a big game. It was a fun game. It was a great fight. Just a great fight. It’s fun to be a part of it.”

It wasn’t much fun for the Royals, as they needed a miscue from Cole to push that series back to New York. That didn’t happen.

“I think his fastball was a little better today,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said. “He located it at the top of the zone where he has a range of 18.20 inches at 96.97 mph. That’s hard to achieve, and I think that’s been the biggest difference for me.”

For Boone, the only question was how long to stay with Cole. The manager thought about removing his ace in the seventh, but he let him get to 21 outs before turning to a bullpen that was great in that series.

Clay Holmes — one of eight pitchers in postseason history to play at least 10 games without allowing a run — pitched a perfect eighth. Luke Weaver did the same in the ninth, striking out two of the three batters he faced to punch New York’s ticket to the next round.

“Absolutely solid,” Cole said of his bullpen. “These guys have been through some ups and downs this year and they persevered. It made her better. They want the ball. We want them to have the ball.”

There’s no one the Yankees would rather have with the ball than Cole, who missed about half the season with a right elbow injury, suffered some initial aches upon his return to action and then returned to top form in time for the stretch run returned.

While New York needs another eight wins to reach the ultimate goal – the one that Cole has pursued since joining the club in 2020 – the ace celebrated the important first step and winning the Division Series.

“I mean, I’m fired up,” Cole said. “Had a few IPAs with the boys and popped some champagne.”

Cole knows that there will have to be two more champagne celebrations for this season to be considered a success.

“There’s still so much baseball left,” Cole said. “We are of course confident. We are focused. We’re trying to improve the type of baseball we play as we get deeper into October.”