Um, no.
Not yet, anyway. Hughes, the wunderkind perpetual work-in-progress who's always just 15 minutes away from being the frontline starter we've always heard he would be, has had two not great starts this season. Okay, one not great and one lousy. Granted. And Phelps, who Yankee fans had heard about but not in the same breath as people like Dellin Betances, Manny Banuelos and, you know, Hughes, has been extremely effective as the "long man" coming out of the bullpen. Phelps is projected as a starter anyway.
So it seems logical that the Yankees should consider switching them up. Hughes has been a very good bullpen pitcher before, and with multiple innings of excellent pitching, Phelps appears to have the makeup of a quality Major League starter right now. Why wait?
First of all, because this is a ridiculously small sample on which to base any decision. That's like taking Mariano Rivera out of the closer role and inserting David Robertson because Mo blew his first save opportunity of the year. Yes, Mariano is Mariano and has more good will built up than any relief pitcher in history, but hey, he had one chance and blew it, while Robertson continues to mow 'em down the second he lets someone reach third. Change them!
There's also, as in any discussion of the Yankees rotation this year, the Andy Pettitte wild card to play. No sense in making any changes to the starting five until we know if Michael Pineda will be healthy anytime soon, and how long it will take Pettitte to convince his 40-year-old body he was just kidding in all of 2011.
Besides, falling in love with a pitcher based on two outings is at best an attempt to break one's own heart. Remember Joba Chamberlain in 2007? Remember Joba Chamberlain every year after that?
Phil Hughes is a solid starter who's going to have some bad days. You might have noticed that CC Sabathia hasn't exactly been setting the world on fire based on his first two starts, and nobody's even thinking about questioning his ability. Yankee fans need to exercise something we don't often use--our patience--and see what kind of year this is really going to be for Phil Hughes.
The upside? If David Phelps continues to pitch this well, we'll know we're on to something very, very good, perhaps the next Ivan Nova (or something better; I'm still not sold on Nova) or if it goes the other way, the next David Robertson. That's not a bad thing.
At the end of today, the Yankees will be one game out of first place with 153 left to play. Can't say I'm really all that concerned just yet.
