#Gerrit Cole takes blame after Yankees disappointment

Gerrit Cole didn’t get much help from his offense or defense Sunday, but he didn’t spare himself from the blame for the Yankees’ 4-2 loss to the Rays.

After giving up three runs, two earned, over 6 ¹/₃ innings at Yankee Stadium, Cole was left ruing not being quite sharp enough to completely silence the Rays.

“I made a fair amount of bad pitches, I certainly got a call or two, they put a fair amount of good swings on it and when it’s all said and done, they ended up scoring just enough to win and that’s baseball sometimes,” Cole said.

More specifically, Cole was frustrated by the third inning. After the Yankees had just taken a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second, he fell behind 1-0 to four of the six batters he faced during the frame as the Rays strung together a two-run rally.

Two misplays in center field by Aaron Hicks didn’t help the cause, but Cole didn’t point the finger elsewhere.

“It’s tough to keep guys on the defensive when you’re constantly falling behind,” said Cole, who struck out 10 and walked none. “Defense aside, all said and done, they’re probably answering back with at least one [run] there. My job is to go out there and throw a shutout inning and try to keep the momentum on our side. I just wasn’t good enough.”

Cole responded by retiring 13 straight batters into the seventh inning before the Rays got to him for the winning run. Yoshi Tsutsugo’s RBI double was the difference, Cole’s final batter after 109 pitches.

“I thought by and large, it was another strong outing for our ace,” manager Aaron Boone said. “We got our ace on the mound today and just couldn’t mount enough.”