Minnesota Twins RHP Scott Baker May Not Pitch In Minnesota Again

The Minnesota Twins suffered a hiccup Wednesday when they found out right-handed pitcher Scott Baker will miss the entire 2012 season to undergo and recover from elbow surgery. This is coming from MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger. The surgery will take about six months to recover from.

Baker will get surgery to repair his flexor pronator tendon. Luckily for Baker his ulnar collateral ligament is fine and he will not have Tommy John surgery like so many pitchers have underwent in the past.

Bollinger tweeted that Baker may not pitch for the Twins again since the club holds a $9 million option on him and have already been talking about bringing up pitching prospects to replace the 30-year old. The Twins are looking at possibly bringing up LHP Liam Hendriks or RHP Anthony Swarzak as well.

It is interesting to see how the Twins will deal with the Baker situation being that he has been a decent pitcher for the team in the past few years. In seven years with the Twins, Baker compiled a record of 63-48 with an ERA of 4.18 while striking out 770 batters. He has won 10-plus games in three seasons.

Last year, his starts were down a bit. He only started 21 games for the Twins but lowered his ERA to 3.14 while winning only eight games and losing six.

To me, Baker was quality pitcher that could give quality games for the Twins but with the prospects the team has in their farm system it will make the decision for interim GM Terry Ryan to make.

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