Robertson hits injured list with sore elbow

PHILADELPHIA -- David Robertson said Monday afternoon that the pain in his right arm is too much to continue to pitch.

The Phillies placed Robertson on the 10-day injured list with “soreness” in his right elbow. They recalled right-hander Drew Anderson from Triple-A Lehigh Valley to take his place in the bullpen.

Anderson pitched two scoreless innings in relief Monday. He walked two and struck out two. But most impressive was that he threw just three pitches in a perfect seventh inning. He got Michael Conforto to fly out and Wilson Ramos and Jeff McNeil to both ground out to end the inning. Jean Segura made a slick diving play up the middle on Ramos' grounder.

Robertson’s trip to the IL is a blow to a team that entered the season expecting him to pitch high-leverage innings late in games. Seranthony Dominguez, Hector Neris and Pat Neshek are the most likely candidates to pitch in those spots while Robertson is out.

“I’ve just kind of been dealing with some elbow pain for a little while,” Robertson said. “Taken some medicine to help and really just trying to just gut it out and pitch through it, but I’ve kind of gotten to a point where I’m not a help to the team right now.”

Robertson, who has never missed time in his 12-year big league career with an arm injury, will have an MRI exam on Tuesday.

“Obviously, we never like to have a guy have soreness, but given the exam that I just was witness to, I feel pretty good about things at this point,” Phillies manager Gabe Kapler said.

Robertson is 0-1 with a 5.40 ERA in seven appearances, but after struggling though his first three appearances, he had thrown 4 2/3 scoreless innings in his last four. He said his arm has been bothering him off and on since Spring Training.

“But nothing that’s not out of the ordinary,” Robertson said. “You can go throughout the whole season, you’re going to have pain somewhere. It’s kind of gotten to that point where the irritation has gotten to be a lot.

“I’m not too worried about it. It’s on my flexor tendon, it’s where it feels like it is. I’ve had this issue before. It’s been years ago since I’ve had it flare up this bad.”

Anderson had an excellent spring. He allowed four runs in four innings in his only start with the IronPigs. Anderson started throwing a cutter this spring, which proved effective.

“Drew will most likely be length for us,” Kapler said. “I told him that it’s possible that he takes down three or four batters at some point, but most likely scenario is that he’s here to allow us to try and win the game with the guys who have helped us win games early in the season.”

More Kingery?

Scott Kingery has eight hits in his previous 12 at-bats, but he was not in Monday’s lineup. Cesar Hernandez, who homered Sunday, started at second base. Maikel Franco, who has a .968 OPS hitting out of the eight-hole, started at third.

“He was a pretty big consideration today,” Kapler said. “You have some pretty good options now. Franco’s off to a great start. Cesar is swinging the bat better and playing pretty good defense. Odubel [Herrera is] off to a good start and Scott’s off to a good start. I think the silver lining here that Scott Kingery has proven to all of us is that he cannot play for a little while and then come back and bang. My expectation is that we’re going to look for ways to get him into the lineup in the next couple of days.”