Even with Clemens, Yankees pitching is still flawed

With Mariano Rivera hurting the team worse than all those hamstring injuries combined and the rest of the bullpen on pace to shatter appearance records, the New York Yankees seems to believe Roger Clemens is the solution to all their woes.

Well, the New York Yankees are out of their minds.

I understand signing Clemens. He’s still great. I even understand paying him more than a million dollars per start. Hey, it’s the market. And I know his presence (assuming he can be bothered to show up on days he’s not pitching) will fire the team up. He is the Rocket after all.

But if the issue is durability within the rotation and especially in the bullpen, then Clemens might actually add to the problem.

Of that older group of still gifted pitchers like Maddux, Glavine, Johnson, Moyer, Smoltz and Schilling, only Clemens averaged under six innings per start last season. Since the Yankees last won a World Series, he’s thrown all of two complete games.

Hell, since 2004, Carl Pavano has pitched into the eighth inning nine more times Clemens. So tell me again how Scott Proctor’s arm will be saved by this five inning phenom.

Obviously, a move needed to be made. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. There are still lots of questions surrounding this flawed group.

And Clemens is hardly the answer to all of them.