Homer Bailey done for 2015, will undergo Tommy John surgery

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Reds pitcher Homer Bailey

Homer Bailey finally came into his own in 2012 and '13, logging 417 innings over those two seasons and throwing a no-hitter in each.

The Reds rewarded him with a six-year, $104 million contract just before spring training in 2014, and it's been pretty much nothing but bad news since.

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The team announced Friday that Bailey will undergo Tommy John elbow ligament replacement surgery, sidelining him until sometime in the 2016 season. That comes on the heels of the procedure to repair a torn tendon in Bailey's forearm that brought his 2014 season to an early finish.

“It does not appear the injury is at all related to the right elbow flexor mass injury Homer sustained late last season," Reds general manager Walt Jocketty said in a release.

Bailey, who turns 29 Sunday, is making a reasonable $10 million this season, but the big money in his fully guaranteed contract kicks in next year with an $18 million price tag. Beginning in 2016, the Reds are on the hook to pay the Texan at least $86 million for the duration of the deal. They can't be feeling too good about that commitment right now.

The diagnosis for his latest injury was not a surprise. Bailey opened the season on the disabled list and made two starts before going back on the shelf. Earlier this week, the Reds transferred him to the 60-day DL.

Tommy John surgery is hardly a career killer, but it will be interesting to see how the former first-round pick bounces back. It took him quite a while to harness his considerable natural ability at the big-league level, and now he'll have to start all over again.

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Marc Lancaster is a senior editor at The Sporting News