TORONTO - As Jesse Litsch struggled on the mound in recent weeks, Toronto Blue Jays manager Cito Gaston regularly wondered if the right-hander had fully recovered from reconstructive elbow surgery a year earlier.

Turns out he was right to be concerned about the 25-year-old's health, only his arm wasn't the problem.

Litsch will have surgery next week to repair a right hip labral tear and the expected recovery time is four to six months. Even though he feels he could continue to pitch -- Litsch says his "nagging" hip troubles began in 2006 -- a decision to have surgery now was made so he will be ready for spring training next February.

The move ends a difficult season in which he seemed to have lost Gaston's confidence.

"It was an up and down year, obviously," said Litsch, 1-5 with a 5.79 earned-run average in nine starts. "It could have been -- a lot of those games could have been wins, could have went either way. But I was back here pitching, that was the main thing I wanted to do. I got back when I wanted to get back from rehab.

"Obviously I didn't want to go 1-5 and end the season like I did in my last start, but you can't do nothing about it. I'm glad I got back, but sad I'm going."

Left-hander Brad Mills will be recalled from triple-A Las Vegas to start Saturday in place of Litsch, who will have a new manager to impress next spring.

Gaston routinely pulled Litsch well before 100 pitches and often said his pitcher had lost both the velocity and command he had during a breakthrough stretch at the end of 2008, when he was 13-9 with a 3.58 ERA. Litsch had ligament replacement surgery last June and was back in the majors about a year later, even though the arm tends not to fully recover until 18 months afterwards.

"I know he did kind of hit a wall sometimes," said Gaston, "maybe (the hip) had something to do with it. ...

"It didn't seem like (the injury) was going to be that bad. It's still not bad ... it's best to do it now."

Litsch had the MRI July 30 and allowed four runs in four innings in a start last Sunday against Cleveland, hardly looking at Gaston when he was taken out of the game. Team doctors read the results Monday and forwarded them to a hip specialist, who consulted with the team Friday leading to the call for surgery, which may help him regain both his low 90s velocity and command.

"They say maybe having the surgery is going to help out the motion, it's going to help me get through the ball more be able to locate better," said Litsch. "Now maybe I'll be able to hit extension side easier than before. I've always done it well, but it's going to be easier to push through."

Though he's had hip issues since 2006, it never occurred to either Litsch or the Blue Jays to correct the hip at the same time he was sidelined after the elbow operation. The initial MRI in 2006 "didn't really show much" and only last week's test revealed the problem's severity.

"We really didn't know," said Litsch. "This was the first MRI since 2006 so it was there and he was like let's just do it to do it, and it turned out to be worse than we all thought. In a perfect world we would have done it when I had Tommy John, but we didn't know about it and now I'm going to be out two more months. I've got to deal with it."

Litsch said he didn't feel pain when he pitched, only afterwards and during workouts. He'll be on crutches post surgery and then have a tough recovery ahead of him.

"My main concern was going to be core and my arm," he said. "I'm going to be doing double-rehab now."