{"id":495048,"date":"2026-02-21T17:01:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T17:01:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/495048\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T17:01:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T17:01:11","slug":"whats-next-for-yankees-gerrit-cole-after-1st-live-bp-test-aced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/495048\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s next for Yankees\u2019 Gerrit Cole after 1st live BP test aced"},"content":{"rendered":"

TAMPA, Fla. \u2014 Everything felt normal again for Yankees<\/a> pitcher Gerrit Cole<\/a> on Friday when he threw to hitters for the first time since his Tommy John surgery last March.<\/p>\n

This wasn\u2019t rehab to him.<\/p>\n

This was all about making pitches to three major-league hitters he faced for a combined four at-bats: Aaron Judge twice, Jasson Dominguez and Trent Grisham once apiece.<\/p>\n

Mission accomplished.<\/p>\n

Dominguez and Judge laced liners to the outfield that would have dropped in for singles if this live BP included fielders, but Cole\u2019s velocity spiked from his bullpens and his command was excellent.<\/p>\n

His four-seamers were close to midseason form, 94-95 mph with a 96.9 mixed in.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was a little surprised,\u201d Cole said before Saturday\u2019s Yankees-Tigers\u2019 Grapefruit League game. \u201cI guess at the same time it\u2019s logical. I\u2019m pretty built up. Things have been looking really good and it\u2019s probably a couple miles an hour under my average for my career. So in those regards, it seems about right.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I hadn\u2019t come really within probably about two or so miles an hour of averaging that velocity (in my bullpens).\u201d<\/p>\n

This felt almost like a game for Cole, who was feeling extra adrenalin.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe threat of the ball coming back at you elevates the stakes a little bit, so there\u2019s a natural reaction to that,\u201d Cole said.<\/p>\n

Cole didn\u2019t talk with reporters after his one-inning, 28-pitch live BP, but was all smiles holding court the day after.<\/p>\n

He was thrilled that he felt so good, thrilled about his command and thrilled how he felt the morning after.<\/p>\n

His rehabbing is going very well, but there\u2019s no thought of rushing to get back to the Yankees instead of probably a best-case late May or early June return.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s great to feel great, but I don\u2019t think it makes me want to accelerate,\u201d Cole said. \u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TAMPA, Fla. \u2014 Everything felt normal again for Yankees pitcher Gerrit Cole on Friday when he threw to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":495049,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85],"class_list":["post-495048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495048","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495048"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495048\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/495049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}