Yes, I understand that the Cy Young award is given for a year's worth of work, however I think a starter's year's worth of work (usually 200+ innings and around 20 wins for a Cy Young Award) is far greater than a relief pitcher who might get 50 saves an pitches just 75-100 innings.
If I were a manager, I would take a guy who can go out every five days and set up the team for 20+ wins than a guy who pitches one inning every couple of games and preserves the lead (most of the time) for that one inning.
20 years ago I would have agreed with you.
However, pitching is so much more specialized these days that the closer is just as important as a start who is only generally going 6 or 7 innings these days....
guys like Clemens are extremely rare anymore. Pitchers aren't going 8 or 9 innings at a whack. This explains why there haven't been more 20 game winners then there have been recently.
We won't ever see anyone go over 300 innings again. eventually even 200 innings will be considered a milestone.