Phillies place outfielder Jay Bruce on injured list, recall Nick Williams

The Phillies placed Jay Bruce on the injured list with a strained right oblique, but the outfielder said he does not expect to be sidelined for long, thanks to the location of his injury.

“Obliques can really be pretty lengthy, but this is more of an intercostal sprain,” Bruce said, explaining that his injury is in front of his rib cage instead of his side. “Optimistic for sure; I’m not going to do anything crazy here for the next couple of days. I’ll let it calm down and go from there. I’m optimistic that it shouldn’t be too much longer. It could be 10 days, it could be 15, I’m not sure. But it’s not nearly as bad as an oblique could be, so that’s a positive.”

The Phillies called up Nick Williams, who was excellent at triple A since being demoted last month. The Phillies will replace Bruce by starting Williams and Adam Haseley, who seems likely to get the bulk of the playing time, as the club gets a look at its 2017 first-round pick. The Phillies started both of them on Wednesday night, with Williams in left field and Haseley in center.

“Nick is in a position to earn reps, and we have a much better idea of Nick Williams and who he, is in a similar way to a lot of the players, because we’ve had longer looks with them than we have with Adam, who we don’t know yet and want to find out by giving him opportunities,” manager Gabe Kapler said. “We’re looking to do that with Adam.”

Bruce suffered the injury on a check swing in Tuesday’s win and was removed immediately. He felt pain in the front of his rib cage, and he had an MRI on Wednesday.

Bruce has been the Phillies’ best power hitter since joining them on June 2. Over the last six weeks, he leads the team in slugging percentage (.564) and is tied for the lead in homers with 10.

The Phillies did not plan for Bruce to be an everyday player, but they were forced to move him into that role when Andrew McCutchen suffered a season-ending injury. Bruce handled the extra workload, starting nearly every game in left field.

“Either in the lineup or off the bench, you lose the veteran presence that understands how to approach most pitchers and has experience against many of them,” Kapler said. “It’s a veteran presence, it’s a high-quality professional at-bat, it’s a guy who attacks fastballs and pitches in the zone but is also disciplined to some degree. We’ve talked about this, that he’s a swinger, but he attacks without chasing a whole lot. That profile with the production is difficult to replace.”

Thursday’s series finale will be aired exclusively on YouTube; search “MLB” on the YouTube app or go to YouTube.com/MLB. Aaron Nola will face Ross Stripling. ... Jean Segura (bruised heel) did not start Wednesday but could return to the lineup on Thursday. ... David Robertson felt good after throwing a bullpen session on Tuesday, but the team is still taking the reliever’s recovery slowly.