Safe to say that the Boston Red Sox-New York Yankees rivalry remains alive and well, especially when Gerrit Cole is on the mound for the Bronx Bombers. His history with Red Sox slugger Rafael Devers was widely noted coming into his start against Boston on Saturday but it added another befuddling chapter in an eventual 7-1 loss for the Yankees.
Cole’s first time facing Devers in that matchup at Yankee Stadium saw him hit the third baseman with an inside cutter on an 0-1 count, a pitch that Red Sox manager Alex Cora said after the game he had no doubt was intentional. But speaking of intentional, things got weirder in the fourth inning for Cole and Devers when he issued a one-out intentional walk with no one on and New York ahead 1-0. It was a decision that was all Cole’s — and one that also came back to bite him.
The Red Sox took the lead in that inning, 3-1, and then continued to pour it on, including a two-RBI single from Devers that ran Cole from the game in the next frame, allowing seven runs in 4.1 innings and taking the loss.
After the game, however, he kept taking L’s, and perhaps none was worse than the one that Red Sox starter Brayan Bello, the winning pitcher in Saturday’s game, delivered afterward.
Brayan Bello eviscerates Gerrit Cole after Rafael Devers HBP, intentional walk
Bello, like many of the Red Sox players and coaches, was asked about the choice to walk Devers and how he felt about it. The 25-year-old didn’t hold back an ounce of his distaste with a simple statement that completely annihilated Cole for making what many perceived as a wholly cowardly decision against a player who has owned him throughout his career.
“I don’t know what to tell you,” Bello said through a translator on the NESN postgame show in the clubhouse. “I feel like he showed a lot of weakness in that moment.”
It might seem simple but Bello calling Cole weak, essentially, for not wanting to face Devers is as biting of a criticism as you can find, especially for a pitcher where the mental game is half (if not more) of the battle.
But it’s also hard to argue that, at least in that moment, it was a show of weakness for Cole. While Devers has indeed tortured Cole in his career — posting a 1.410 OPS with eight home runs and 20 RBI in 16 games — it’s one thing to try and avoid trouble when facing him but it’s another entirely to not even truly try to make something happen and to do so seemingly without the full support of Aaron Boone, his teammates, and the coaching staff.
What makes it look even worse is that Devers has been nothing like himself of late, struggling mightily trying to grind out the remainder of the year through two shoulder ailments. If there was ever a time for Cole to try and make a statement, it would’ve been Saturday, and he still wanted no part of it and paid for exactly that.
One thing that’s for sure, though, after all of these comments, it should be a fun finale on Sunday in the Bronx.
