ST. PETERSBURG -- The Rays' bullpen took another blow Saturday, as the team placed right-hander Ryne Stanek on the 10-day injured list with right hip soreness.

Stanek, who leads the team with 41 appearances (27 of them starts), has been one of Tampa Bay's most consistent options this season. Despite struggling as a reliever with a 7.82 ERA, he has thrived in the opener role, posting a 2.09 ERA in his starts.

Rays manager Kevin Cash said that Stanek has been dealing with this injury for some time, but the club hopes that it’ll be a short stint on the injured list.

“The worst thing that happened for Ryne, everybody appreciates the All-Star break, but when that break came, there wasn’t a ton that he was doing, and when he came back in Baltimore, it started to grab him a little more.

“We were at a point with him that we felt that we should get this thing cleaned up, and get some treatment and some rehab going on before it becomes something that really sits him out for a long period of time. We’re hopeful that this is a really short stint.”

The Rays activated Chaz Roe (right flexor strain) from the injured list, and he’ll look to build on a solid outing before the break.

In Stanek’s absence, the Rays will play matchups and will alternate from among a group of players to serve as the opener. They could go with Diego Castillo, Hunter Wood and Andrew Kittredge as openers, or they could transition toward allowing pitchers like Ryan Yarbrough to start more games without an opener.

“I think we have a bunch of candidates that can [open],” Cash said. “Any of those guys in the bullpen, whether it’s Woody, whether it’s Kitt, we had talked about Diego doing it before the break, but we’ll just pitch the right matchup and slot in, or we might just do like we did [Saturday] and let Yarbs start.”

Castillo has a 2.65 ERA in 11 starts last season, while Wood has a 3.18 ERA in 10 career starts. Kittredge hasn’t opened a game for the Rays, but he had some experience with Triple-A Durham this season.

Tampa Bay also recalled Wood and optioned left-hander Brendan McKay, which has been a theme after his starts this season. McKay, Tampa Bay's No. 2 prospect and baseball's No. 22 per MLB Pipeline will continue to be a big part of the Rays’ staff in the second half of the season, but the Rays need to continue to manage his workload, while also keeping fresh arms in the bullpen.