Cole looking for even better things in 2016
BRADENTON, Fla. — It would be hard for Gerrit Cole to top his 2015 performance.
However, don’t tell that to the Pirates ace right-hander.
Cole is looking for even better things in 2016 after finishing fourth in the National League Cy Young voting last year in just his second full major league season.
“You can always improve,” Cole said. “You never have this game totally figured out. Believe me, I still have a lot more to learn. Last year was a helluva year for me and team, there’s no denying that. That being said, I’d be disappointed if I didn’t have a better season this year.”
Cole was 19-6 with a 2.60 ERA in 32 starts a year ago. He struck out 202 in 208 innings, while allowing 183 hits and 44 walks.
The wins were the most by a Pirates pitcher since John Smiley went 20-6 in 1992.
Yet like Cole, Pirates general manager Neal Huntington thinks the 25-year-old right-hander is capable of more. After all, the Pirates used the first overall pick to select Cole first overall in the 2011 amateur draft from UCLA, then gave him a franchise-record $8-million signing bonus.
“Gerrit is so driven and so smart and so talented that there is some room for growth,” Huntington. “I don’t know if there’s going to be exponential growth like we saw from the day he was drafted to what we see now. But, there is still some room for improvement and growth and refinement and learning how to pitch to contact early or get the punch out late, or how he’s going to use his pitches.
“Just continued maturity, continued development. I think we all wish we knew then what we know now and Gerrit is just in the middle of that phase.”
One of Cole’s primary objectives is throwing more changeups to better complement his blazing fastball and hard curveball.
“I’ve worked on throwing the change in different counts,” Cole said recently at the Prates’ spring training camp. “It doesn’t matter how hard you throw, if hitters can gear up for hard stuff then they are eventually going to catch up to it. I have to be able to use the changeup more for an element of surprise and to disrupt the hitters’ timing.”
Cole looked like a shoo-in to pitch on opening day Sunday against the St. Louis Cardinals at PNC Park. However, an inflamed right ribcage set him back at the beginning of camp and he is instead tentatively slated to pitch the fourth game of the season April 8 at Cincinnati against the Reds.
Cole is naturally disappointed that he won’t be ready for opening day, but he said having a chance to pitch in a World Series would easily trump that honor. In fact, Cole is even hungrier to get the Pirates to their first Fall Classic since 1979, when they beat the Baltimore Orioles, after being the losing pitcher against the Chicago Cubs in last year’s winner-take-all National League wild card game at PNC Park.
Cole admitted that losing was tough to swallow, especially after the Pirates’ 98-64 record in the regular season was the second-best in the major leagues.
“Just brutal,” he said. “It still makes me mad if I think about it. But you turn the page and move on. It’s a new season. What happened last year doesn’t matter now.”
Regardless of how this season goes, Cole will a big moment on Nov 12 when he marries his college sweetheart Amy Crawford — sister of San Francisco Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford — in their native California.
Game 7 of the World Series is tentatively scheduled for Nov. 2.
“We’re cutting it close,” Cole said with a smile. “If we win the World Series and then 10 days later I got married, it would be the best 10 days of my life.”