It’s only April 21 and already the Yankees’ bullpen is being stretched too thin. The problem is that part of Generation Trey may not quite be ready for the majors.

Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy have averaged less than four innings per outing and the bullpen is being forced to pick up the slack. It has left many fans anxious at what that means for this season and it also has Hank Steinbrenner drooling over the panic button.

His solution: move Joba Chamberlain to the rotation. Now.

“I want him as a starter and so does everyone else, including him, and that is what we are working toward and we need him there now,” Steinbrenner said to the NY Times. “There is no question about it, you don’t have a guy with a 100-mile-per-hour fastball and keep him as a setup guy. You just don’t do that. You have to be an idiot to do that.”

Steinbrenner calls it a mistake to have put him in the bullpen in the first place and now wants that reversed as soon as possible.

“The mistake was already made last year switching him to the bullpen out of panic or whatever,” Steinbrenner said. “I had no say in it last year and I wouldn’t have allowed it. That was done last year, so now we have to catch up. It has to be done on a schedule so we don’t rush him.”

The tentative schedule to work Joba into the rotation has been to start him in the bullpen before moving him to the rotation near the middle of the season. This plan also calls for a possible minor league stint. Although it is hard to imagine the Yankees sending him down unless they have a 10 game lead in the division. The plan is tentative because if Hank is chomping at the bit in April it’s hard to imagine him waiting until July or August before switching him to the rotation.

Steinbrenner went on to tell the Times that he is unhappy with the way the Yankees chose the rotation coming into this season. “The starting rotation is not what I would have chosen at the beginning of the year, but that is not a big news flash to anyone,” he said.