Jason Marquis will be activated by the Padres on Thursday and will start against the Giants at Petco Park.

"I'm excited to get going," Marquis, 33, said "Mentally, I'm refreshed. I feel good physically."

The last 10 months have been rough for Marquis, who has a 106-102 record with a 4.63 ERA in a career that spans 13 seasons and now eight teams.

Last Aug. 15, a line drive off the bat of then Met Angel Pagan hit Marquis below the right knee, fracturing his fibula. Marquis, who was pitching for Arizona at the time, didn't realize the severity of the injury until an inning later after he had batted and thrown 13 more pitches.

And earlier this spring, Marquis missed two weeks of spring training with the Twins after his seven-year-old daughter Reese suffered near-fatal injuries in a bicycle accident. She had a lacerated kidney, lost 3 1/2 pints of blood to internal bleeding and needed four rounds of surgery while spending nine days in a medically induced coma.

"The timing with what happened to my daughter threw everything off," said Marquis. "It was the toughest time of our lives. The support I got from friends and family was great."

Marquis never got on track with the Twins. He had a 2-4 record with a 8.47 earned run average when the Twins released him 10 days ago.

"We're excited to have him take the ball," Padres manager Bud Black said Wednesday. "The reports on him from the Double-A staff were that he's using the same mix of pitches we've seen from him, the sinker, slider, cutter, split."