Gerrit Cole had to come to the rescue for New York Yankees teammate Nestor Cortes on Sunday after a mistake by catcher Kyle Higashioka.
Cortes started for the Yankees on Sunday against the Baltimore Orioles, and pitched a rare immaculate inning by striking out the side on nine pitches in the fourth inning. Obviously, it would be worth saving the baseball to commemorate the feat, but Higashioka tossed the ball into the crowd as he was coming off the field.
After Higashioka was shamed in the dugout, Cole intervened and negotiated the return of the game-used ball.
Higashioka will take some grief for this, but it probably isn’t as bad as this mistake was.
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