Brad Lidge has Knee Surgery

Written by Benny B. | 14 January 2010

For all those phillie phans whooping it up after hearing the news that Carlos Beltran underwent surgery with or without the Mets blessing, allow me to temper that excitement:

According, to the News Journal, Brad Lidge underwent another "knee scoping" operation similar to Carlos Beltran's yesterday:

Lidge, it turns out, had his right knee scoped yesterday by team physician Dr. Michael Ciccotti at the Rotman Institute at Thomas Jefferson University. The procedure involved the removal of loose bodies and a “meniscal debridement.” In November, Lidge had a bone chip removed from his right elbow, but the knee surgery comes as even more of a surprise considering the answers Lidge’s agent, Rex Gary, has been giving all winter about the sound condition of the closer’s right knee, which gave him problems during the first few months of last season but was believed to be healthy during the second half.

So, if they had a similar opperation, it is safe to assume the recovery time will be about the same, which in Beltran's case is 12 weeks.  Considering that this opperation was performed on Lidge's push off knee, it could take some time for him to regain full velocity.

I guess that means newly acquired Baez with his 4+ ERA will be assuming the closer duties while Lidge recovers.  One would think that the Phillies knew about this issue with Lidge, and thats why they went out to sign Baez.  However, if that is the case, and they did know, why did they wait weeks for Lidge to have this operation?