By Josh Liddick, Sports Talk Philly Staff 
Phillies starting pitcher Aaron Nola was placed on the 10-day DL retroactive to April 21, due to lower back strain.
General Manager Matt Klentak explained the situation in a statement on Monday:
"Aaron experienced soreness in his lower back during his start on Thursday (against the Mets)," GM Matt Klentak said in a statement. "After receiving treatment over the last few days, the symptoms improved, but he still felt some tightness during his side session yesterday. Our hope and expectation is that this will not be a lengthy DL placement and that Aaron will miss only one or two starts."
Nola missed a majority of last season with an elbow injury, but has experienced an increase in his velocity since that point. Nola gave up four runs over five innings against the Mets last Thursday, but besides that, he has been pretty spot-on.
With the hope that Nola will only miss one or two starts, the Phillies will need to bring up a starter to replace the righty on the team until he can come back healthy.
Two options for the Phils as logical replacements for Nola in the rotation temporarily are Nick Pivetta and Ben Lively. Lively was just called up last week when Pat Neshek went on paternity leave. Pivetta is pitching a dazzling 3-0 with a 0.95 ERA and 24 K's in three starts for the Triple-A IronPigs.
The hope will be for Nola to come back after only a couple missed starts and be able to contribute in a normal capacity.
The nice thing with the new DL structure is that 10 days is just enough time to recover from a minor injury like Nola is experiencing.
