KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Gerrit Cole and his new right elbow will, in fact, allow a run at some point.
It just has not happened yet through his first two starts back in the big leagues after Tommy John surgery.
Cole looked very much like his vintage self Wednesday night in a dominant showing against the Royals, striking out 10 across 6 ²/₃ scoreless innings to help the Yankees finish the sweep with a 7-0 win at Kauffman Stadium.
The 35-year-old right-hander scattered just four hits and did not walk a batter while pounding the strike zone all night. After tossing six scoreless innings against the Rays in his season debut Friday, Cole’s toughest opponent Wednesday was once again his pitch count, capped at 79 as the Yankees continue to build him back up carefully.
But Cole made the most of those pitches, dialing his fastball up to 98 mph for a called strikeout in the fifth inning on a night when his command was on point.
The Yankees (34-22) have acknowledged there will be some inevitable bumps in the road for Cole as he settles back into pitching every five or six days, but until then, he has only offered a tantalizing preview of elevating an already strong rotation.
Paul Goldschmidt, Ben Rice and Ryan McMahon provided most of the offense, each recording a pair of hits and combining to drive in six runs, as the Yankees won their 14th straight game against the Royals (22-34) — including outscoring them 50-10 in the now-complete season series.
Cole had only two strikeouts in his season debut, but matched that in the first inning alone Wednesday and then kept piling on.
Even more encouraging was that after walking three batters against the Rays, Cole only had two three-ball counts all night Wednesday.
The first came in the fourth inning when he fell behind 3-0 to Bobby Witt Jr., who had the green light and popped out to second base. The other came against the final batter he faced, Carter Jensen, who drew a full count with one out and one on in the seventh inning before also popping out.
The Royals’ best chance against Cole came in the bottom of the third, but it ended on the strength of Aaron Judge’s right arm. After Michael Massey roped a one-out double, he tried to come around to score on Maikel Garcia’s two-out single to right field.
But Judge played the ball on a hop and then unleashed a cannon of a strike to home plate, where Austin Wells slapped the tag on Massey for the third out.
A night after the Yankees racked up 24 hits, they were retired in order the first time through the lineup by Royals lefty Noah Cameron.
But Goldschmidt got them in the hit column, leading off the fourth inning with a single through the right side, and soon in the run column as well.
Rice came up next and smoked a fly ball the other way — 104.5 mph off the bat — that hit off the left field wall and took a long ricochet, allowing him to leg out an RBI triple.
Judge then drove in Rice on a sacrifice fly to give Cole a 2-0 lead with which to work.
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The Yankees later added on in the seventh after loading the bases on singles from Trent Grisham and McMahon around a walk from Anthony Volpe. It looked like they might waste the opportunity as the next two batters were retired, but the lineup flipped over for Goldschmidt, who drew a walk to force in a run.
Rice then roped a single through the right side to score two more and make it a 5-0 lead.
After entering Tuesday in an 11-for-66 rut, Rice has now gone 5-for-9 with two walks over his last two games.
McMahon, starting his first game since Sunday, capped off the scoring in the eighth inning with a two-run blast to the opposite field, which is where four of his five home runs have now gone.
