Gerrit Cole is on his sixth minor league rehab start. He is throwing every five days. The radar gun is reading the way it used to. The Yankees rotation needs him in a major league uniform yesterday.
The rehab process has been longer than anyone in the Yankees front office wanted. Cole had Tommy John surgery in spring training of 2025. The 14-month timeline is standard. Cole is right on schedule. That does not make the wait any easier.
The Yankees rotation has been a problem all season. Max Fried has been the ace. Carlos Rodon has been inconsistent. Marcus Stroman is back on the IL. The depth options have been getting hit. The team has been carrying three or four bullpen arms more than usual to cover starts.
Cole’s return changes everything. He is the only true No. 1 starter on the roster, and a healthy version of him gives Aaron Boone a usable playoff rotation. The Yankees are first in the AL East despite the rotation issues, which says more about the offense than the pitching.
The radar gun reads on the last few rehab starts have been encouraging. Cole has been sitting 95-96 with the fastball and touching 98. The slider has the same shape as before the surgery. The changeup has more separation than it used to, which is the thing that has the development staff most optimistic.
The schedule is mapped out. Cole will make one more rehab start, probably this weekend at Triple-A. If everything holds, he joins the major league rotation for a start the following week. The Yankees have been deliberately conservative because there is no reason to rush him with the team in first place.
The bigger conversation is about Cole’s long-term shape. He turns 36 in September. The Tommy John recovery rate for pitchers over 32 is not as good as it is for the younger arms. The expectation is Cole comes back. The realistic expectation is that he is closer to the second tier of front-line starters than the absolute top one.
That is a problem the Yankees can solve. They have Fried locked in. They have a Cole-light version returning. They have minor league pitching depth that has actually held up. The deadline shopping list is bullpen first, lineup second, and a starting pitcher only if something falls apart.
For Cole personally, this is the year his career arc bends. He has been one of the best pitchers of his generation. The Cy Young in 2023 was the cap. The injury was the test. Coming back at 35 and performing at a high level is what separates the pitchers who finish strong from the ones who do not.
The Yankees need him. Boone has been honest about how much the rotation has been pushed thin without Cole. Brian Cashman has been managing the bullpen workload accordingly. The whole pitching staff gets to exhale once Cole is back, and that exhale is two weeks away if the rehab keeps going the way it has been going.
The American League will not be a free pass once Cole is back. Toronto and Baltimore are real. The Tigers have figured things out. The Yankees need their ace if they want to be the team that comes out of the AL in October. The next start is the one that gets them there.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
