Year-After Effect: Cole, Fernandez, Wacha among pitchers at risk

Gerrit Cole helped the Pirates return to the postseason in 2013 but he saw a major increase in his workload.

Keith Srakocic/AP

MLB teams no longer ask pitchers to work as much as Maddux did -- or Tanaka did in Japan. No matter. Tanaka appears to be good enough to engender such risk. Teams are willing to lay down more than $100 million on the bet that what never would be done with the likes of Wacha, Cole, Gray and Fernandez will be just fine for Tanaka.