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First Pitch: Putting Gerrit Cole’s Recent Slump in Perspective

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Every so often, I’ll get a request for a weekly feature on the site where we discuss which prospects are moving up in the rankings, and which ones are moving down. The idea is always to show how the recent results from players improved or decreased their rankings.

This has never been an approach we’ve taken, instead opting for a more long-term approach. We do one big ranking for the Prospect Guide, and a mid-season update, which I always feel is good, but not nearly as good as the pre-season ranking.

A more frequent update would make the rankings meaningless. If the rankings can change based on one week of performance, or even a few weeks of performance, then the rankings weren’t really that strong to begin with.

I take this same approach over to my MLB analysis. I’m the furthest away from reactionary as you can get. And the Pirates are in a situation right now with Gerrit Cole where reactionary analysis is going to look really poor, while a long-term view is probably going to be the most sensible approach.

Here’s the long-term view: Gerrit Cole is a top pitcher in the game, who is in a slump right now, and will eventually get out of this slump.

The short-term view? Gerrit Cole is not an ace, he’s not even a number three starter, he’s the last option you’d want pitching in the playoffs, and other over-reactions.

And then there’s the facts. Out of 166 qualified starters since 2013, Cole ranks 21st in ERA, 25th in xFIP, and 20th in WAR. Last year was kind of a breakout year for him, where he ranked 7th in ERA, 14th in xFIP, and 9th in WAR out of 78 qualified pitchers.

Gerrit Cole has been good for several years, and last year he took a step up to being a number one starter. This year he had a good ERA, but the advanced metrics showed he wasn’t performing as well as last year. And lately, he hasn’t even put up a good ERA, getting hit pretty hard in his last few outings. Alan Saunders had a breakdown of what was going wrong with Cole after today’s start.

I’m not here to provide any theories on what is happening with Cole. I’m here to add some perspective. Just a few weeks ago, Cole had a 2.73 ERA and a 3.93 xFIP. After a few bad outings, he has a 3.55 ERA and a 3.94 xFIP. The xFIP is a bit misleading, as it assumes Cole will have a 10% HR/FB ratio. He had a 6.5% rate last year, and has been around 7.3% in his career, currently sitting at 6.1%. The FIP, which doesn’t normalize the HR/FB rate, has him at 3.17 now, and 2.88 a few weeks ago (although at that time, his HR/FB rate was too low, at 3.7%).

At the start of August, Cole was a guy who was still performing well, although maybe not as good as last year. His numbers were still more in line with what we’ve seen out of him from 2013-2015. So if we’re taking the same approach I take with scouting reports, that’s where Cole is established. He has since had four bad starts, and it would be foolish to make any proclamations about the type of pitcher he is, other than to say that he’s a guy going through a slump right now.

This is all just an argument about small sample sizes. It’s easy to get lost in the short-term results during a season. The days in a season can feel like forever. It seems like a lifetime ago that Cole threw a complete game, giving up one run. But that was less than a month ago. And when you’re on a rough stretch like the one he’s on now, each poor outing makes the time pass slower, because you’re just waiting for that next start, hoping that this is the one where he breaks out of the slump.

Every player goes through slumps. I could dig through the numbers right now and show you pitchers who are slumping, who every Pirates fan would want written in the lineup card for a Wild Card game in big permanent marker. But I don’t feel that’s necessary, because the idea that every player goes through a slump at times in a season or a career isn’t groundbreaking.

The problem is that when the slump happens to a player on your team, you start to care. If Cole was on another team right now, Pirates fans would love to have him, and would overlook the recent results for what they are. Likewise, Cole gets docked for losing the Wild Card game, with comments about how he’s not a number one starter because of that game. Yet you would never hear anyone knock Johnny Cueto’s upside because he lost the 2013 Wild Card game. The grass is just greener on the other side.

This all makes sense. There is legitimate concern when a player is struggling, especially a player like Cole. The Pirates are getting great results from their rotation right now, minus Cole, but when everyone is at their best, no one is better than Cole. They’re in a tight Wild Card race, and every win counts, so losing a stretch of games from your best starter hurts. And if they make the Wild Card game, Cole is absolutely the guy you want starting, which makes the current struggles a concern.

But that fear is largely based on four games, and ignoring what has happened for almost four seasons. It’s the classic “can’t see the forest for the trees” approach. Cole will eventually break out of this slump, and a year from now, we won’t even remember that he struggled for a few games. Until then, the hope is that he gets back on track quickly, as the Pirates need every game from him in the current Wild Card race.

That’s the way I prefer to view these situations. Focus on how they impact the short-term, while separating the feelings of the short-term results from the long-term evaluation. Gerrit Cole is a top of the rotation starter. He’s just not pitching like one right now.

**Prospect Watch: Keller Continues Shutout Streak; Escobar Impresses for Morgantown. Some solid outings tonight from two of the more promising lower level arms.

**Breaking Down Gerrit Cole’s Recent Struggles After Today’s 5-4 Pirates Loss. Alan Saunders breaks down the struggles from Cole recently.

**Pirates Notes: The Impact of Winning in the Minor Leagues. Alan also talks with the prospects about their time in the minor league playoffs, and how that helps them in the current playoff chase.

**Injury Updates: Glasnow’s Next Rehab Start, Kang Resuming Fielding Drills. The latest injury updates, with the next step for Tyler Glasnow, and progress from Jung Ho Kang.

**Morning Report: How Much of a Hit Will the Farm System Take by the End of the Season? John Dreker looks at who might graduate from prospect status and who might still have eligibility at the end of the year.

Tim Williams
Tim Williams
Tim is the owner, producer, editor, and lead writer of PiratesProspects.com. He has been running Pirates Prospects since 2009, becoming the first new media reporter and outlet covering the Pirates at the MLB level in 2011 and 2012. His work can also be found in Baseball America, where he has been a contributor since 2014 and the Pirates' correspondent since 2019.

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