The Case for Extending Gerrit Cole

While we have a few days before the Astros play again, I thought we could spend a few minutes working through the logistics of one of Crane/Luhnow's biggest offseason decisions: extending Gerrit Cole. This is laid out point by point, the Case for Extending Gerrit Cole:

Argument 1: Because it's not our money.

Argument 2: Because it's Gerrit F. Cole. 

This should not be discounted as a throwaway argument. Gerrit Cole turned 29 years old three weeks ago, so technically 2020 will be Cole's Age 29 season, since he pitched the majority of 2019 at Age 28. If we look at B-Ref's Similarity Scores (scroll down), here are the ten pitchers most similar to Gerrit Cole through Age 27 (I guess B-Ref only updates these once a year):

1. Kevin Millwood

2. Cole Hamels

3. Dennis Leonard

4. Stephen Strasburg

5. Doug Drabek

6. Josh Beckett

7. Jered Weaver

8. David Price

9. Johnny Cueto

10. Ron Darling

There's not a ton to inspire confidence there. Hamels is...Hamels. Strasburg, sure. At some point I'll write a post on who the hell Dennis Leonard is, but after you've seen what has happened to David Price, do you want to commit $200m+ to that? Aha! But there are two stories here, because there are two phases of Gerrit Cole: Pre-Houston and With-Houston Gerrit Cole.

Pittsburgh Cole: 127 starts, 782.1IP, 749H/304ER, 734K:203BB, 67HR, 3.50 ERA / 1.22 WHIP, 112 ERA+, 15.4 fWAR

Houston Cole: 65 starts, 412.2IP, 285H/123ER, 602K:112BB, 48HR, 2.68 ERA / 0.96 WHIP, 164 ERA+, 13.4 fWAR.

That's right. Houston Gerrit Cole has been almost as valuable in just over half the starts as Pittsburgh Gerrit Cole. He's a different pitcher. The strikeouts have been discussed ad nauseum and, while the stikeouts are a perfectly valid part of the story, it doesn't tell all of it. With Houston, Cole went from an above average pitcher - certainly worthy of a 1-1 pick - to a Hall of Fame pitcher. 

Consider that Cole has been worth 13.4 fWAR over the last two seasons. Here is the two-year peak in fWAR for members of Cole's "Similar Pitchers" list:

Dennis Leonard (1977-1978): 12.6

David Price (2014-2015): 12.3

Jered Weaver (2010-2011): 11.3

Josh Beckett (2007-2008): 10.0

Cole Hamels (2011-2012): 9.7

Kevin Millwood (1999-2000): 9.5

Johnny Cueto (2015-2016): 9.0

Doug Drabek (1992-1993): 8.9

Stephen Strasburg (2015-2016): 8.0

Ron Darling (1985-1986): 5.3

Two things: (1) Dennis Leonard? I retract my earlier slander. (2) Ron Darling benefited the most from being on a team that probably shouldn't have won a World Series. (Bonus): Stephen Strasburg? Maybe not worth the hype?

So, the point of this is saying Gerrit Cole is basically unbelievable. He has thrown 200+ IP in three straight seasons. His K/9 has increased from 8.7 in his last season in Pittsburgh to 12.4 in 2018 to 13.8 in 2019. 

3. The Competitive Window of the American League:

Who is good right now? List them:

The Astros, the Yankees, the Twins, the A's, the Rays. Hey wow that's all the playoff teams from this year. Maybe you could slot Cleveland in here. 

Next tier: Cleveland (?), Boston? 

Further along in their rebuild: Toronto, Chicago, Arlington (?), Anaheim (?)

Gonna be a while: Baltimore, Kansas City, Seattle, Detroit

Point being that the Astros have a wide-open window to dominate the American League for the next few years, and extending Gerrit Cole throws that window open. The Yankees won't be hurt forever, I don't think. Oakland will literally run 25 Mormon missionaries out there for 162 games and still win 92 of them. So when the Astros have to take a step back once Verlander and Greinke retire and Correa does [waves hands] whatever he will do, and Brantley and Reddick move along, there's still Altuve, Bregman, Yordan, and...Gerrit Cole, and you probably have another few division titles, pennants, and who knows about World Series banners. Which leads to Point...

4. The Astros need a couple of years to develop their pitching prospects at lower levels.

With the Greinke trade, the Astros sent a couple of pitchers they were maybe counting on to contribute earlier to Arizona in Corbin Martin and J.B. Bukauskas. It doesn't matter that Martin won't pitch until late 2020 and Bukauskas has been an absolute roller-coaster over his entire career.

So who's left? Here's the last year the Astros have their current starting pitching staff:

Miley: November

Verlander: 2021

Greinke: 2021

McCullers: 2022

On the other hand, the Astros have the following solid pitching prospects who just need some time: Jose Urquidy (not as much time needed, obviously), Forrest Whitley, Cristian Javier, Brett Conine, Jojanse Torres, Brett Daniels. Will they all pan out? Perhaps not, but having 2020-2021 with Verlander, Cole, Greinke, and McCullers will help the Astros keep the window open while they figure out who can stick. 

It's worth it to me, because it's not my money that's being spent (and I distinctly remember the $26m Opening Day Payroll year), to extend Gerrit Cole. He's clearly the best pending free agent, the Astros have shown a willingness to extend their players (Altuve, Bregman, Verlander). Signing Cole to an extension means he doesn't go through what Keuchel or Kimbrel, or Machado or Harper went through last offseason. And extending Gerrit Cole means he doesn't go to any other team, those of whom are deemed threats to a dynasty the likes of which have not been seen since the 1990s Yankees. 

Friday Morning Hot Links

Wade Miley had a historically bad start for the Astros at a really bad time. Again. The Astros were down 7-0, 7-1, 7-3, 7-5, 8-5, tied it up at 8-8, down 9-8, tied at 9-9, and finally walked it off with a Michael Brantley home run to win an improbable game 11-9. Relievers got 39 outs. Houston is 91-50, 52-17 at home. There are 21 regular season games left.

*Oakland scored seven runs in the 7th to beat Anaheim 10-6. So the relevant leaderboard looks like this:

Best Record

New York (92-49): -
Los Angeles (92-50): -0.5
Houston (91-50): -1.0

AL Wild Card
1. Tampa (83-59): +0.5
2. Oakland (81-58): 0.0
3. Cleveland (81-60): -1.0

*Updating the Home Franchise Record leaderboard:

1998: 55-26
1980: 55-26
2015: 53-28
2005: 53-28
2019: 52-17
1986: 52-29
1979: 52-29
1969: 52-29

*Houston has won 13 of their last 17 games. They're 10-3 in extra-innings. The Astros are 13-1 against the Mariners in 2019, having won eight straight games, three of those being walk-offs. They're 24-2 against the AL West at home in 2019.

*The Astros' largest previous comeback in 2019 was five runs, so last night's game set a new season-high. McTaggart notes that it's the biggest comeback win since July 18, 1994, when the Astros beat the Cardinals 15-12. Hinch:
We just hung in there, we kept chipping away, we got some big swings and we look up and we tied the game. We kept that game alive and ultimately the big swing at the end with Mike. A lot happened in that game and obviously it started out terribly for us but finished in dramatic fashion.

*On August 14, the day after Gerrit Cole couldn't take the mound for his start in the second game of a double-header against Chicago (on the front end of a 17-games-in-17-days stretch), Wade Miley threw 3.1IP, allowing 9H/7R (3ER). Thursday night, on the first of 11 games in 11 days, Miley didn't even record an out, allowing 5H/5ER, 0K:1BB. He threw 31 pitches. It's his worst start since September 14, 2017 when he allowed 6H/6ER in 0.1IP to the Yankees, but it only took him 19 pitches to do that.

Miley is the 3rd pitcher in 2019 (White Sox' Dylan Covey and the Mets' Steven Matz) to start a game and not record a single solitary out. The Astros' Scott Elarton did it on July 8, 2001 and Jim Deshaies did it on July 16, 1991, but both threw less than five pitches each. Though the pitch data for the franchise is incomplete, Miley is the first Astros SP to throw more than 20 pitches in a start and not record an out since Jim Clancy did it on August 3, 1989. Miley:
It's the best I felt in a month. They had me today. Tip your hat. Sometimes you get your butt whipped and I got my butt whipped.

Having only thrown 31 pitches, he should be good here in a couple of days to go back out and try it again.

Cy Sneed, Jose Urquidy, Joe Biagini, Joe Smith, Roberto Osuna, Hector Rondon, and Josh James combined to throw 13IP, 7H/4ER, 15K:3BB.

Crazy game win probability chart for the Mariners at Astros tonight... pic.twitter.com/rsUZLi8ZO9

— Daren Willman (@darenw) September 6, 2019

*Kyle Tucker hit the first MLB home run of his career in his 78th PA, and then added an RBI single to push the game to the 13th inning. The Astros are 1-0 all-time when Kyle Tucker hits a home run.

*Before Brantley's single in the 6th, he was on an 0x17 slump since his 19-game hitting streak. It was Brantley's first walk-off home run since August 3, 2014, when he did it against the Ramgers. Brantley:
I think that's what makes a team special, a never-give-up attitude and we're always in every game, and we did that tonight.

Brantley's 20th home run of 2019 ties his career-high.

*Josh Reddick was 3x3 with a walk and hit his first home run since June 28.

*Brian McTaggart has your Meat Wagon updates:

-Springer is day-to-day with a "mild concussion."
-Pressly will play catch from the mound on Friday.
-Peacock will play catch for the first time and could rejoin the team before the regular season ends.
-McHugh hasn't played catch since going back on the IL on August 31.

-Correa:
We've got to take it slowly because I don't want to rush into it and play a week and then get hurt again and miss the playoffs. We're building up for me to play every playoff game we're going to play. That's the main goal. Focus on the rehab and get back to 100 percent and show up and keep playing all the way until November.

Carlos Correa was called up on June 8, 2015. The Astros played 104 games after, and including, the game in which he joined the Astros. Including Thursday night's game, the Astros have played 731 regular season games in the Carlos Correa Era. Correa has played in 543 of those games, or 74.3%. He'll be 25 on September 22.

In that same span, here's the percentage of regular season games in which various Astros have played since June 8, 2015 (note: some of the following will include games played while members of other organizations, but everyone ):

Altuve: 89.2%
Springer: 81.7%
Correa: 74.3%
Brantley: 63.5%

Correa has played in 72 games in 2019 (massage, back), and has missed 40% of the Astros' regular season games since the beginning of 2018. Yordan Alvarez - called up on June 9 - will match Correa's 2019 season total in games played next week.

MEANWHILE, Correa has switched representation on the advice of [shuffles notes] Alex Rodriguez, and will be represented by Rachael Ray, Bobby Flay, and Al Roker's agent, Jon Rosen. Correa will be his first MLB client. This - every word of this entire section - is all so very tiring.

*Well well well Aaron Sanchez's tiddy issue turned into an apparently massive shoulder issue as he will have surgery next week that will shut him down for the season. Hinch:
We may see him back here at some point in September just as a teammate. It's a bummer for him. It's tough for us. We expected him to contribute down the stretch and unfortunately he won't be able to pitch.

At this rate, given the "good news" surrounding Springer, it'll be amazing if Springer's brain is actually still in his head.

*Might have linked to this earlier (in the week, in the season, you never know with SI) but the Astros' pitching revolution is a remarkably simple fix, writes Stephanie Apstein...shortly before Wade Miley crapped the bed.

Minor-League Playoffs!

*Another night, another walk-off win for Round Rock as they take a 2-0 lead in the Best-of-Five round with a 4-3 win in the 10th. Brandon Bielak threw 6IP, 8H/3ER, 3K:1BB and Bryan Abreu and Riley Ferrell combined to throw 4IP, 1H/0ER, 4K:2BB. Taylor Jones got the game-winning knock. Game 3 is tonight in Iowa.

*In the wake of Hurricane Dorian, now a Category 1 aiming for Alabama North Carolina's Outer Banks today, Fayetteville and Down East (tied 1-1) will resume play tonight.

*Quad Cities dropped the potential clincher in the 1st Round Best-of-Three to Cedar Rapids, 2-1. Brett Daniels threw 6.1IP, 5H/2ER, 10K:2BB. The top five in the lineup were 0x17 with 9K:0BB. The deciding Game Three is tonight.

*Miami pitcher Brian Moran recorded his first career MLB strikeout...against his younger brother, Former Astros Great Colin Moran.

*Skip Hollandsworth: Schlitterbahn's Tragic Slide.

*The Guardian: "London Bridge is Down:" The secret plan for the days after the Queen's death.

*Outside: The Legend of Baltimore Jack (one thousand baseball writers just woke up from their sleep, smiling at the Springsteen reference, and they do not know why).

*True Story: I thought about this song yesterday morning and spent three hours trying to remember the melody, piecing together nine years of almost-constant music listening in order to get a snippet of a line, which finally turned into something Google-able, which ultimately led me to actually getting the name and artist. A Musical Selection: