Injuries to the offense continue to mount up for the first place Nationals. Manager Dusty Baker confirmed that second baseman Daniel Murphy did not start Tuesday's 7-3 loss to the Marlins because of a sore hip. Left fielder Howie Kendrick already missed the game because of a tender back. The club has also been playing without starters Trea Turner, Jayson Werth and Michael A. Taylor. Then Tuesday night watching right-hander A.J. Cole battle the Marlins, Baker deferred to pitching coach Mike...

ANAHEIM, Calif. - It is a storyline that comes up it seems every August. Right about the time that the Little League World Series begins in Williamsport, Pa. Someone will interview Orioles second baseman Jonathan Schoop about the time his team won the championship. Schoop and the kids from the tiny island nation of Curacao played in the LLWS not once, but twice. They had a strong showing in 2003. They won the championship in 2004. Schoop began that final game batting third and playing...

The second A.J. Cole-Vance Worley matchup in a week didn't go any better for the Nationals than it did the first time. In a rematch of Wednesday night's blowout loss in Miami, Worley once again handcuffed the Nationals lineup while Cole served up a couple of towering home runs to the Marlins during a 7-3 loss that looked all too familiar. Worley, the journeyman long reliever/spot starter who dominated the Nationals during seven scoreless innings six days ago at Marlins Park, wasn't quite as...

ANAHEIM, Calif. - After a strong outing on Monday night in the series and road trip opener, Orioles right-hander Dylan Bundy is lined up to make his next start on Saturday, pitching on the normal four days' rest. The Orioles keep looking for ways to get Bundy extra rest and he had an extra day of rest before last night's start. Then he went out and pitched seven innings, allowing five hits and two runs with no walks and 10 strikeouts, a new career high, on 105 pitches in beating the Angels...

ANAHEIM, Calif. - Besides having a mid- to high-90s fastball and nasty slider, Orioles right-hander Mychal Givens has something else that helps him pitch well as a reliever - a short memory. When Givens took the mound Friday night at Camden Yards in the eighth inning, he was trying to protect a 2-1 lead for Kevin Gausman and help the Orioles beat the Tigers. When he entered that game, he had pitched to an ERA of 0.60 his previous 26 games. But he allowed two singles and a walk, and with the...

Nationals Right-hander A.J. Cole got off to an outstanding start with strikeouts of Dee Gordon and Giancarlo Stanton. He finished off a 1-2-3 first inning with a groundout off the bat of Christian Yelich. He hit a batter in the second and endured a fielding error by second baseman Adrián Sanchez in the third, but managed to complete three innings without allowing a run or a hit. The Nats broke through against Marlins starter Vance Worley in the third. Brian Goodwin doubled and took third on...

Enny Romero was back throwing on the field at Nationals Park this afternoon, cleared to begin ramping up again after tests revealed the left-hander is dealing only with muscle tightness in his forearm and nothing more serious than that. Romero had to come out of Wednesday's game in Miami after complaining of arm trouble, and the Nationals placed him on the 10-day disabled list and sent him back to Washington while the club proceeded to Chicago for the weekend. Romero said he was examined by...

With the arrival of three new relievers - Ryan Madson, Sean Doolittle and Brandon Kintzler - general manager Mike Rizzo has done a nice job of retooling the Nationals bullpen. It has already made life easier for manager Dusty Baker. On Monday night, Baker employed Kintzler and Doolittle to get the final six outs in a 3-2 Nats win over the Marlins. But did Baker consider Madson in last night's situation? "All three of those guys have been in those situations before. All three have closed. All...

The Nationals' rotation is getting back to normal, with Max Scherzer having returned last night and Gio Gonzalez set to return tomorrow night. But there's one more stop-gap start needed from a fill-in tonight, and so A.J. Cole will be taking the mound to face the Marlins for the second time in a week. It didn't go so well for Cole in Miami; he allowed five runs in five innings, four of those coming during a rough bottom of the fifth. We'll see if the right-hander is able to make any...

ANAHEIM, Calif. - After their Manny Machado and Dylan Bundy-led 6-2 victory Monday night, the Orioles try for two wins in a row over the Los Angeles Angels tonight. The Orioles (56-56) have won eight of 10 and 14 of the last 21 games. They have won three straight by a combined 23-7 score and are 21-33 on the road. Machado hit his fifth career grand slam in the seventh inning Monday to break a 2-2 tie. Bundy fanned a career-high 10 without a walk and improved to 11-8 with an ERA of...