After flirting with perfection, Yankees ace Gerrit Cole bolsters elusive Cy Young bid

NEW YORK – Chasing after his first Cy Young award, Yankees ace Gerrit Cole suddenly found himself pursuing perfection Thursday night.

Cole set down the first 16 Toronto Blue Jays at Yankee Stadium, bringing some liveliness to an otherwise dull late September, with no pinstriped hopes of playing through October.

Dominating the Jays’ mostly potent lineup with an expert mix of fastballs, breaking pitches and changeups, Cole’s bid for a perfect game ended with one out in the sixth.

That’s when Alejandro Kirk drove a double to right-center field.

A crowd of 37,646 fans gave Cole an appreciative ovation and the right-hander went back to work, striking out Kevin Kiermaier and getting George Springer on a grounder to end the inning.

New York Yankees’ Gerrit Cole pitches in the first inning of a baseball game against the Toronto Blue Jays, Thursday, Sept. 21, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)

Cole tossed a two-hitter and the Yankees completed a 5-3 win, ending the wild-card contending Blue Jays’ five-game winning streak.

Over eight innings, Cole yielded one run on two hits, with no walks and nine strikeouts.

With the win, his 50th as a Yankee, Cole (14-4) lowered his already league-leading ERA to 2.75 and he crossed the 200 innings threshold for the sixth time in his career.

“To me, he’s the Cy Young,’’ Yankees manager Aaron Boone said recently, with Cole having emerged as the odds-on favorite for the league’s top pitching award.

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Over his 11th big-league season, Cole has five top-five finishes in Cy Young balloting.

In 2019, Cole finished a close second for the AL Cy Young award with the Houston Astros, narrowly topped by teammate Justin Verlander.

This season, “I think he’s really put it all together from a consistency standpoint, game in and game out,’’ Boone said.

“I feel like he’s managed situations, no matter what’s going on in a game – whether he’s dominating or in games where it’s been a struggle for him.

“His ability to constantly make adjustments has stood out to me.’’

With the slumping Giancarlo Stanton on the bench, Jake Bauers batted cleanup and blasted a three-run homer off Jose Berrios, giving the Yankees a 3-0 lead in the first inning.

Working with a 5-0 lead in the eighth, Cole gave up a leadoff double to Matt Chapman, who eventually scored on a wild pitch.

As Cole exited the mound, he walked off to a hearty ovation from the Stadium crowd.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Gerrit Cole Cy Young bid bolstered in Yankees win over Blue Jays