Gerrit Cole is one of the biggest MLB free agents this off-season. While most teams won’t be able to pay him close to $300 million, these three teams might.
Gerrit Cole was a good but not great starting pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates but then the Houston Astros grabbed him and made him into the best starter in the game.
He is now set up to earn the most money ever by a starting pitcher after giving Justin Verlander a run for his money for the 2019 American League Cy Young award. He was so anxious to become one of baseball’s best MLB free agents that right after the Houston Astros were eliminated from the World Series, he put on his Scott Boras hat for his media session after the game.
So, for this exercise we are taking the Houston Astros out of the running for Cole, as I don’t think there is a big chance that he will return, especially after he didn’t even get out of the bullpen in a winner take all Game 7 of the World Series, despite being the best pitcher on the roster.
As I mentioned, Cole will command a whole lot of money, as his agent is Scott Boras who likes to drag things out until shortly before Spring Training in hopes to drive up the price.
So, with that said there will be teams that might be in the running for Cole early in the bidding like the Houston Astros, but then deep-pocket teams are the ones that will remain deep into the winter as the price gets more clear. The San Francisco Giants are a team that should be in the running but they aren’t ready to win next year, so I don’t think they are going to try hard enough to land Cole.
Without further ado here are the top three suitors from third to first for the hottest player on the market.