The Cubs have gone back to scrap heap of injured pitchers to try to find lightning in a bottle.
The Cubs signed Scott Baker to a one-year contract. Baker sat out all of the 2012 season due to Tommy John surgery.
Before 2012, he spent time with the Minnesota Twins.
Baker, 31, has career numbers over 7 years of 63 wins, 48 losses, 4.15 ERA in 159 starts. He has a career 1.264 WHIP and 3.44 K/BB ratio.
His best season was 2009, when he went 15-9, 4.37 ERA in 200 IP.
In 2012, on the DL, he made $6.5 million.
Twins fans believed that it was a foregone conclusion that the Twins would decline Baker's contract option, but quickly re-sign him to a new contract. The Twins are in need of pitching, and have a known quantity with Baker. The only way Baker would leave the Twins, fans thought, was if he was offered a 2 or 3 year contract elsewhere. Apparently, the Twins front office decided not to match Baker's 1 year offer from the Cubs, which may not raise a red flag, but put it on the rope of the flag pole.
Baker is automatically penciled in to take Volstad's slot in the rotation. A rotation that is still in the state of flux. Matt Garza is the default number one, pending recovery from injury. Jeff Samardzija is slated as the number two starter. Travis Wood is the only lefty with experience so he moves up to the number three starter. Baker becomes your default number four pitcher, pending recovery from injury. And the Cubs are praying that Adrodys Vizcaino can recover from his injury to join the rotation sooner than later. So the Cubs have 3 of their 5 starting pitchers (60%) coming back from significant injuries. That appears to be the new team pitching standard.
Baker is the second Twin pitcher taken by the Cubs. Earlier, the Cubs claimed injured AAA reliever Carlos Gutierrez.
