More questions than answers as Phillies prepare to send Halladay to disabled list

All of the important questions are ones that cannot yet be answered. We do not know how long the Phillies might be without Roy Halladay. We do not know who will replace him in the rotation. We do not know anything about the pain in his shoulder except that it is there, and that the veteran righthander told the Phillies about it after he allowed nine runs while recording seven outs in a 14-2 loss to the Marlins at Citizens Bank Park on Sunday afternoon.

Halladay revealed the injury to reporters after the loss but did not take questions, mostly because he does not seem to have many answers right now. General manager Ruben Amaro Jr. said that Halladay will likely undergo diagnostic tests in California, where the Phillies start a three-game series against the Giants on Monday, at some point early this week. Halladay said the plan was to have Dr. Lew Yocum examine the shoulder in Los Angeles.

According to Halladay, the pain in his shoulder first appeared after a start against the Pirates on April 24, when he struck out eight and allowed one run in six innings of work. In the two starts that followed, including Sunday's, he allowed 17 runs with seven strikeouts and six walks.

"I woke up, didn't really think anything of it, just regular soreness, it just kind of progressed over the last two weeks or so," Halladay said. "It's right shoulder discomfort, gonna have it looked at here in the next few days, and once we get information from that we'll obviously let people know what's going on, but it's not something that I had before. It's something new this year. I felt good all spring, felt good all year, I just got up after that start in Pittsburgh and had soreness and just wasn't able to get rid of it. Like I said, we'll go to L.A. I think and get it checked out, do some scans, get Yocum to look at it and update you guys from there. But that's really all I have. We don't have a lot of information on it. We did some tests and obviously they are not completely conclusive as to what it is. There's a couple of different options and the scans, MRIs, CTs, that kind of stuff will give us more information from there and we'll address it then. But as far as moving forward, I really don't have too much for you. We'll see how it plays out in the next few days. As soon as I can get in to see him we'll get that done and try to get you guys information as soon as we can."

Amaro indicated that the team was preparing to place Halladay on the disabled list, but that it first needs to figure out what to do with its roster. One option is lefthander Adam Morgan, who impressed the Phillies during spring training and who pitched on Sunday at Triple-A Lehigh Valley. Morgan is not on the 40-man roster, meaning a spot would have to be cleared to acommodate his addition. Righthanders Tyler Cloyd and Ethan Martin are both on the 40-man roster. Cloyd last pitched on Friday, when he struck out 10 with no walks and allowed one run in eight innings of work. Martin has struggled with his command all season. Morgan allowed four runs with six strikeouts and two walks in four innings on Monday. He has a 3.89 ERA on the season.