Astros fan favorite eviscerates Gerrit Cole with biting World Series insult

Gerrit Cole dropped the ball. Well, actually he wasn't even in position to catch it, but you get the point. The New York Yankees starter cost his team dearly on Wednesday night, and ultimately, his gaffe in the fifth inning led to an epic collapse. The Yankees are now licking their wounds while the Los Angeles Dodgers are celebrating a World Series championship.

In case you missed it, the Yankees led Game 5 of the 2024 World Series 5-0 heading into the fifth inning and Cole was cruising. But a comedy of errors (literally) allowed the Dodgers to plate five runs in the inning and tie the game. LA ultimately won the game by a final score of 7-6 and notched their eighth-ever World Championship.

Cole's final line from the game is incredibly misleading. Officially, right-hander allowed five runs on four hits, but none of them were earned. Cole exited after 6 2/3 with the game tied. But former Houston Astros fan favorite Roy Oswalt has a problem with the official scorer's recollection of the events, and took to social media to air his grievances.

Astros fan favorite Roy Oswalt eviscerates Gerrit Cole with biting World Series insult

You see, while Cole wasn't necessarily responsible for all five Dodgers' runs that crossed the plate in the fifth inning, if he'd have covered first base on a bouncer up the line, LA probably would have been sent back to the dugout still in a five-run hole. He would have recorded three consecutive outs with the bases loaded, two via the K. He would have been a hero.

He was not a hero.

Aaron Judge dropped a catchable fly ball to center field that put runners on first and second. Yankees shortstop Anthony Volpe was then charged with a throwing error that loaded the bases. But back-to-back strikeouts from Cole calmed the storm and put New York one out away from staving off the Dodgers' rally.

But the unthinkable happened when Mookie Betts hit a soft ground ball to first baseman Anthony Rizzo. Cole didn't cover the bag and Rizzo was not fast enough to touch the base himself, allowing Betts to reach safely. Los Angeles plated one run, and as the inning motored along, the Dodgers scored four more on back-to-back two-strike hits from Freddie Freeman and Teoscar Hernández.

PFP (pitcher's fielding practice) is little league stuff, and it's definitely something preached to players during spring training. Cole's lack of awareness or flat-out inabliity to cover first base led to five runs.

Oswalt's social media commentary was rather humorous. The former Astros pitcher, obviously having no pity on Cole, posted a still photo of the moment in question with Cole's stat line below it. In the earned run column, Oswalt x'd out the zero and added the number five with an asterisk.

Oswalt's right, While it won't show up in the final line, Cole was intimately involved in his team's fifth-inning collapse. If New York gets out of the that inning unscathed, it's quite likely we're talking about Game 6 back in Los Angeles.

But there's not a single Astros fan who's going to shed a tear for the Yankees. Though it wasn't Houston who eliminated New York this postseason, the Yankees will still be heading home without a World Series championship.

More Houston Astros News and Rumors