Gerrit Cole gave Yankees almost everything they needed in aces World Series return

Gerrit Cole left the game with the lead and in line for the win Friday night.But his Yankees World Series debut didn’t go as planned after he left.While Clay Holmes stranded Cole’s runner in the seventh, the Dodgers tied the Yankees in the bottom of the eighth to cost Cole a win.For the most part, Cole did what he usually does in a 6-3, 10-inning Game 1 loss at Dodger Stadium.After being inconsistent in two of his three postseason starts this year, the right-hander allowed one run in six-plus innings and didn’t walk a batter.He whiffed only four but retired 11 straight batters after Freddie Freeman’s two-out triple in the bottom of the first.And Cole also provided some length, which the Yankees hope they can use to their advantage over the Dodgers makeshift rotation during the series.On Friday, though, right-hander Jack Flaherty pitched 5 ¹/₃ innings before Dave Roberts left him in to face Giancarlo Stanton, whose two-run homer gave the Yankees the lead.Cole survived a scare from Shohei Ohtani to lead off the bottom of the first, when Ohtani hammered the first pitch to center, where Aaron Judge made the catch.And Cole stranded Freeman at third later in the inning when Teoscar Hernandez’s liner was snared by Anthony Volpe at short.But he mostly cruised through the second, third and fourth innings before Kiké Hernandez tripled to right.And this time, Cole wasn’t able to get out of it, as Will Smith followed with a sacrifice fly to center for the only run allowed by the Yankees ace.Aaron Boone went to Holmes with one on and no one out in the seventh and Holmes barely got out of the inning unscathed.It was Cole’s first World Series start since 2019, when he was with the Astros and limited the Nationals to one run in seven innings in Game 5 in a series Washington — and Soto — won....