Plus, opponents aren’t afraid to face Bruney. They don’t see him as a weapon as they do Hughes.

They can’t even pitch him back to back days because they are fearful of his elbow. That’s a big problem, made bigger if you take Hughes out of the bullpen.

You can’t burn out Coke and Aceves everyday.

If Bruney was healthy and pitching well, and Marte was also healthy, that’s different.

Since that’s not the case, it makes it much tougher to move Hughes out of the pen right now.

wang needed to return to the rotation wich left us with 6 starters & hughes would not benefit from going down too AAA because he needs to learn how to get major leaguers out.

the experience he is getting now is priceless & will help him a ton next year not to mention he helps the ml club.

the right thing would of been to leave hughes in the starting rotation until the as break with wang staying on the dl but what is done is done.

the concern i have is if we get another injured starter we are in trouble or could be.that is why i would of kept hughes in the rotation & kept trying different bullpen arms until one stuck.

mitre,mcallister,dunn,etc….

i think it is easier to survive a weaker 8th inning compared to being down a starter or two not to mention we have bruney.

we should of also probably tried to trade for an 8th inning arm before we became desperate.

Results dictate who a 5th starter is. Its the results, not the name, that you are replacing.

They turned a weakness into a strength by putting Hughes in the bullpen.

Right now, there isn’t any reason to weaken the bullpen by taking Hughes out of the rotation.

What if Mitre gives them reasonable production in the that slot? If he does, nothing changes and the team continues to roll along.

Hughes should have never been sent to the bullpen and this is one of the reasons why.

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I wasn’t a fan of the idea either even though I had no qualms that Hughes could do a good job.

My problem with the move at the time was this very reason. Injuries were inevitable. These guys weren’t all going to make every start, so this very situation was going to arise sooner or later.

I wanted Hughes to remain the sixth starter. I guess we should blame Cone for screwing that formula up. LOL.

Junior said Hughes was “filthy” out of the bullpen. A “real weapon”.

He said that if the Yankees make the playoffs, with Hughes and Joba in the bullpen, its almost unfair.

That’s coming from a HOF who HATES, and I mean HATES, the Yankees.

This isn’t brain surgery. You don’t create two holes trying to fill one.”

I got to hand it to Griffey he’s honest. Yeh hearing that doesn’t make me want to pull Yusssse from the BP. Srsly if Cashman does that we’d have to check his medication.

The only thing is, if Wang doesn’t return to form this year, and that is looking very likely, Joba will have to be in the postseason rotation. If Wang does come back strong, and Joba can go to the PS pen, they will be very strong with Hughes, Joba, and Bruney in front of Rivera.

But, first things first, they have to deal with the 5 spot in the rotation to get to the PS. I think either Hughes or Aceves should go to the rotation if Wang is serious. If it is in the 2-3 week range, maybe they can get by with Mitre, Igawa(yikes), and whoever else might be ready to make a ML start. Bad break for Kennedy looking even worse for him now. If he was healthy and doing well in AAA, he would have been the obvious move.