#Gerrit Cole looks every bit the Yankees ace in intrasquad game

If not for the No. 4 train rumbling above River Ave., you could have heard the rodents burp around Yankee Stadium on Thursday night.

Inside the ballpark, the Yankees participated in the second intrasquad game of spring training 2.0 with Gerrit Cole the main event.

Working in his first intrasquad game of the rebooted spring training, Cole was his usual self, which meant he wanted to make every pitch to all the batters he faced.

Outside of Miguel Andujar’s opposite-field home run to right in the first inning, Cole looked like what he is: the Yankees’ ace despite getting used to the new baseball protocols, which caused confusion about when a ball can remain in play and when it can’t.

Cole talked about it being nice to throw five innings, bouncing back from a walk, being happy with the 65 pitches he threw and how all four of his pitches behaved.

What Cole, who inhales information about everything pitching related, couldn’t describe is the empty ballpark he worked in, which will be the norm if MLB gets to a regular season. And he didn’t know if it will be something that causes a problem or an issue he can overpower like he does hitters with a 97-mph fastball and filthy slider.

“I don’t know. This is the first kind of real most game-like scenario I have been put in with it,’’ Cole said after throwing five innings and retiring the final 10 batters he faced after walking Estevan Florial in the second inning with two outs. “It is certainly different. I didn’t have trouble focusing tonight. Try to get in my space and do what I do.’’

Cole figured his body feels as if it is the second half of a normal spring training, but closer to the halfway mark than the end. If the season launches, Cole will be Aaron Boone’s starter against the defending World Series champion Nationals in Washington on July 23.

Even with empty seats, the excitable Cole found a way to muster adrenaline.

“I tried to find that middle ground between too high or too low,’’ Cole said. “It was one of those where I was trying to get up and make sure I was focused because you want to make it as much as businesslike as you can. It was nice to see and feel the competitiveness on the field. That is just a testament to the guys, everybody is bringing it.’’

At the top of that list sits Cole, the $324 million investment Hal Steinbrenner made with the hope he helps the Yankees win multiple World Series titles.

Mike King, who started opposite Cole, sits at the opposite end of the pitching spectrum. He has thrown two big-league innings in one game last year but isn’t naïve enough to think he wouldn’t benefit from not watching Cole work and was impressed with the intensity.

“He does not take a pitch off and I talked to him about his in-between start routine, the bullpens in between are max effort,’’ King said. “He doesn’t want to overdo it. He doesn’t want to throw 56-pitch bullpens, which I do because I like throwing as much as I can. He wants to be game-like every time he is on the mound. So when he is on the mound in his bullpen, 15-20 pitch bullpen, every single pitch was full intensity. In this intrasquad, the first one of spring training 2.0, he is mad at himself for missing pitches.’’

Which is a good bet to continue even with silence filling ballparks instead of roaring reactions to strikeouts.