While Cole’s agent, Scott Boras, negotiated a seven-year, $163.5 million extension with the Astros for second baseman José Altuve last spring, Boras generally prefers his clients to establish their values on the open market. For Cole, who is eligible to hit the open market at the end of the season, Boras almost certainly would want a deal in excess of the largest contract awarded a free-agent starting pitcher this offseason — six years, $140 million to left-hander Patrick Corbin. Cole, like Corbin, would reach free agency entering his age-29 season. And while lefties are a rarer commodity than righties, Cole is the more accomplished pitcher, and not by a small margin. His ERA, when adjusted for league and ballpark, is 17 percent better than the league average; Corbin’s is nine percent. In virtually every statistical category — strikeout rate, strikeout-to-walk rate, fielding independent pitching — Cole holds a substantial edge. A short-term, high-dollar extension for Verlander, who will pitch at 37 in 2020, also would appear to be a long shot. The Astros, one of the game’s most analytically driven clubs, are unlikely to pay market value to a pitcher of Verlander’s age. And Verlander, who finished second in the 2018 Cy Young voting, probably would not want to take a pay cut from his current salary of $28 million.