PRESS RELEASE: - OF - Mike Baxter

The New York Mets today announced the club has re-signed outfielder Mike Baxter to a minor league contract and invited him to major league Spring Training.

Baxter, 27, hit .235 (8-34) with six runs scored, two doubles, one triple, one home run and four RBI in 22 games with the Mets last season.

The 6-0, 195-pounder started the year in San Diego's organization rehabilitating ligaments in his left thumb which he injured during Spring Training. He was claimed off waivers by the Mets on July 22.

He hit .188 (12-64) with one home run and seven RBI with Buffalo (AAA) of the International League in 2011.

Baxter, who grew up in Whitestone, Queens, graduated from Archbishop Molloy High School in 2002 and attended Columbia University his freshman year before transferring to Vanderbilt University.