The Houston Astros Have Acquired Gerrit Cole (For Real This Time)
This past Wednesday, it was reported by Jon Morosi that the Pittsburgh Pirates had agreed to trade Gerrit Cole to the Houston Astros. Ken Rosenthal had reported that the two teams were close. Less than an hour later, Jeff Passan swooped in and said no, no, no. Fake news. And we’ve basically been waiting ever since to find out what the hell happened, because for Morosi to have that the deal was done and Rosenthal to have that they were close, well, then they had to have been REALLY, really close. Those two dudes are as rock solid as it gets for MLB news.
Three days later, we have our answer. Cole is, indeed, going to Houston to form one of the best one, two, three punches of any rotation in baseball with Justin Verlander and Dallas Keuchel. Can’t really rank them yet, because we don’t know where guys like Yu Darvish and Jake Arrieta are going, who could both certainly bump a team up a few spots when they decide where they’re signing. Regardless, the Astros have now joined the likes of the Nationals, Indians, Dodgers, Yankees, (feel like the Mets should be at least mentioned here) and Red Sox for the top one, two, three punches in baseball.
Advertisement
As I wrote this past week, for as exciting as it is for Astros fans to acquire a pitcher of Cole’s caliber, he doesn’t exactly come with a suitcase full of guarantees.
The addition of Cole doesn’t come without question, though. Like, how will he adjust to pitching in the American League? A lifelong National League guy, there’s often an adjustment period when switching from the NL to the AL, even for some of the game’s best pitchers. How will he hold up injury-wise? Cole has been in the league for five years, and he’s made 30 starts just twice, eclipsing 200 innings in both of those seasons. He’s averaged 20.6 starts per year in the other three seasons. One of those 30-start, 200-inning seasons was this past year, but he also posted a career-worst 4.26 ERA, his highest mark of home runs allowed per nine innings (1.4), and a career-worst FIP (4.08).
The Astros are obviously hoping that Cole’s 2017 season was an outlier, as he’s got a career ERA of 3.50 and a WHIP of 1.22, so the larger sample has been quite good. He’ll be under team control for two more seasons before reaching free agency, and if you’re an Astros fan wondering if an extension could be coming to justify whatever Houston had to give up to acquire him, it’s important to note that Cole is a client of Scott Boras, which means, no. No, that’s probably not happening, and he’ll become a free agent in two years.
The addition of Cole also fills a void in Houston’s rotation for 2019 that’ll be left if and when Keuchel leaves via free agency. But until that happens, the Astros will get to stake claim to having one of the best rotations in baseball, assuming this deal actually goes down.
Well, that deal has, in fact, gone down. It’s Verlander, Keuchel, and Cole. And after that, you’ve got Lance McCullers, Charlie Morton, Brad Peacock and Collin McHugh to choose from, who combined to make 80 starts for the Astros last year with a 3.59 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, and a 10.12 K/9. Yikes.