Gerrit Cole Struggles in Yankees' Loss

Gerrit Cole struggled in the Yankees' 5-3 loss to the Detroit Tigers on Monday. He allowed five runs and nine hits in 4 1/3 innings.

The Yankees pushed Cole's start back a day, but the extra rest didn't help. He struck out five but fell to 2-2 in six post-Tommy John surgery big-league outings.

Cole threw 89 pitches, and 61 strikes, before manager Aaron Boone removed him for Paul Blackburn with one out in the fifth inning.

Cole has been good since he returned to the mound last month, but Monday was his worst outing by far. He got 11 swinging strikes and nearly tight roped through the first three innings despite allowing the leadoff man to reach in those frames.

But the dam broke with two outs in the third when four straight Tigers reached with two outs, and they plated a pair of runs to go up 3-1.

The Yankees dropped their third straight game but still lead the Tampa Bay Rays by two games atop the American League East. Cole said his struggles were not a function of elbow soreness or post-Tommy John surgery rust.

Budding Yankees nemesis Riley Greene was in the middle of it all, scoring twice including a no-doubt, 422-foot solo home run that put Detroit up 5-1.

The opposition is going to put pressure on you sometimes, said Cole. The reality is, it's not the try-hard league. It's the get-it-done league, and we just didn't get it done tonight.

Boone thought Cole got beat by a good offense Monday. I thought stuff-wise, it was alright, Boone said. He had some swing and miss going; had some strikeouts. They didn’t miss, though. When he missed or was a little off with the fastball, they were able to square it up.

Cole faced 24 batters and retired only 13, which is surprising since the Tigers are 24th in the majors in runs. The Yankees pushed him back from his scheduled start Sunday to throw Monday in Motown.

They pressured him with a lot of good at-bats, Boone said. Even early in the first couple innings, he held them off the scoreboard, but they were able to get the leadoff runner on and pressure him and make him work pretty hard.

They put some good swings on some pitches they got in a little bit of the heart of the plate, Boone said.