i think 2 reasons: 1 - they thought his early season stuff in long relief was encouraging and could produce ok enough results against a guy who has been shelled in his first 2 MLB starts. Remember when we used to start guys like Adam Warren and Trevor Cahill and inexplicably it worked? It always seemed to work back then just as it always seems to fail now. 2 - They are in the middle of their most difficult and strenuous stretch of the season and they want to take a chance and help keep the veteran arms like Lester and Cole (and I guess Yu) rested. Of course this goes completely against their "urgency starts in april" mantra they went on and on about in the spring, and even if this was the plan it should have been thrown out the window when Hendricks went on the DL, but who knows what the horsefeathers the FO and manager is doing these days I'm gonna be honest, I only remember Adam Warren and Trevor Cahill sucking Warren did suck (at least until the damn instant we traded him back to the Yankees), I think he meant somebody else. Cahill was actually quite good in 15 and 16, though he only started once.