Yankees better not waste what's turning out to be crucial Gerrit Cole resurgence

Every rival fan who had been bad-mouthing Gerrit Cole before the All-Star break seems to be in "big trouble now," as Billy Madison would say. The New York Yankees ace finished his abbreviated first half strong against the Baltimore Orioles and then kicked off the second half by dominating the Tampa Bay Rays.

Though Yankees fans will probably express some sort of nervousness during every Cole start because of his elbow issue, the right-hander all but officially annoucned that he was "back" on Friday night.

For his second outing in a row, Cole reached the six-inning mark and threw over 100 pitches, which is an excellent sign after an extended absence and lengthy rehab characterized the first few months of 2024. Prior to those starts, Cole went four innings, four innings, five innings and 4 1/3 innings, and reached 90 pitches just twice.

Every reasonable fan knew that was his second rehab stint, though. He needed some MLB reps before fully dialing in and getting up to speed.

Well, it appears it only took him 17 1/3 innings to get there, and the Yankees better not waste the return of the reigning AL Cy Young winner with feeble offensive performances in the second half. So far, so good. They won his last two starts and provided 10 runs of support.

Yankees better not waste what's turning out to be crucial Gerrit Cole resurgence

New York limped into the break, going 8-18 over their final 26 games. They deleted an incredible cushion they created for themselves, which was especially upsetting because they had already weathered the toughest injury storm in the previous months.

Some inexplicable regressions with Anthony Volpe and Alex Verdugo as well as guys like DJ LeMahieu, Gleyber Torres and the like failing to step up have been killer. The Yankees have THREE players who have logged at least 30 games with above-average OPS+ marks (Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, Giancarlo Stanton) in 2024. That's unacceptable.

The starting rotation and bullpen did its job to battle as much adversity as possible. Then, when some finally regressed a bit (Carlos Rodón, Marcus Stroman, Clay Holmes, etc.), the offense went on another classic 2021-2023 stretch of disappearing. These units must balance themselves out.

No other team in the league will have the luxury of getting a player of Cole's caliber back to full strength for the second half. He's coming off a year where he was the undisputed best pitcher in baseball, and it appears he's ready to replicate that for the remainder of 2024.

The offense did its job scoring six runs on Friday night. We know it's not possible for every day to be a hit parade, but the Yankees were given a second life with Cole's return. It must be maximized under any and all circumstances if this team wants to make a World Series run.