Dusty Baker wants his team to play better in day games. Having your star home run hitter crank one out of the park in the first inning helps. Facing Brewers starter Michael Blazek, Bryce Harper launched a two-run shot over the right-center field wall to give the Nats a 2-0 lead in the first inning. It marked the first time in the series the Nationals scored first. Brian Goodwin had doubled in front of Harper. Harper's hitting streak is now at 19 games, a career high and the longest this season...

The Nationals placed Stephen Strasburg on the 10-day disabled list this morning, a move they continue to say is one of precaution and one they hope will only sideline the right-hander for one start. Nothing changed in Strasburg's diagnosis over the last 48 hours, according to Dusty Baker. The organization wanted to be cautious all along and made adjustments to Erick Fedde's pitching schedule so their top prospect would be available to replace Strasburg in the big league rotation...

The Nationals have recalled left-hander Sammy Solis from Triple-A Syracuse and placed right-hander Stephen Strasburg on the 10-day disabled list with a right elbow nerve impingement, retroactive to July 24. Strasburg would be eligible to return Aug. 4 at Chicago against the Cubs. It is interesting to note, however, that Strasburg was placed on the disabled list with an elbow nerve impingement. Previously the Nationals had termed it a forearm injury. Elbow injuries in pitchers, especially those...

The Washington Nationals recalled left-handed pitcher Sammy Solis from Triple-A Syracuse on Thursday and placed right-handed pitcher Stephen Strasburg on the 10-day disabled list, retroactive to July 24, with a right elbow nerve impingement. Nationals President of Baseball Operations and General Manager Mike Rizzo made the announcement. Solis, 28, returns to the Nationals' Major League roster after six games with Triple-A Syracuse. The left-handed reliever went 1-2 with a 4.50 ERA in six...

Five batters into Wednesday night's game, Gio Gonzalez had served up the longest home run in Nationals Park history, allowed a double and then that same player to steal third without any attempt to throw him out, and allowed a run to score on a strikeout. Sounds like the recipe for a disastrous outing, right? Not exactly. Despite a shaky top of the first, Gonzalez quickly rebounded and wound up going seven strong innings. He didn't earn the win, but he kept the Nationals in position to come...

They had, as Ryan Zimmerman put it, "played 15 innings of terrible baseball over the last day and a half," leaving themselves in the precarious position of losing two straight to the Brewers without so much as scoring a run. But then Daniel Murphy lofted a seventh-inning pitch from Jimmy Nelson over the right field fence, and now at least the Nationals were on the board, trailing Milwaukee by only one run. And then - well, let's just say the bottom of the eighth tonight on South Capitol...

There's something almost sinful about wasting a quality start from Ubaldo Jiménez, who's registered five of them this season among his 16 outings. It's like the canteen scene in "Three Amigos" with Chevy Chase gargling and spitting out his water and dumping the rest in the desert sand while Steve Martin and Martin Short are practically dying of thirst. (YouTube it if the reference is lost on you. Martin's expression is priceless.) Jiménez made one bad pitch or none yesterday,...

The Nationals are calling up right-hander Erick Fedde to start in place of Stephen Strasburg on Saturday against the Rockies. Manager Dusty Baker confirmed that Strasburg will go on the disabled list Thursday, retroactive to July 23. In his last start Sunday at Arizona, Strasburg finished only two innings and left, citing "achiness" in his arm. Nationals head athletic trainer Paul Lessard described it Tuesday as a nerve impingement in his arm that has since been alleviated. "Yes. (Fedde) is...

Written in 1922, T.S. Eliot's epic poem, "The Waste Land," is considered a masterpiece of poetic writing. The characters in the poem are many, the sense of depression drips from their stories and there is little politeness in this work. Eliot wrote this in the aftermath World War I in a world of chaos and change. He himself struggled to figure out where mankind was headed, to the point of a depression that sent him to a sanatorium. It was there that much of this work was written. His friend...

The Nationals are planning to promote right-hander Erick Fedde this weekend, putting their top pitching prospect on track to make his major league debut and perhaps give Stephen Strasburg more time to rest his arm. Fedde's promotion from Triple-A Syracuse, confirmed by a source familiar with the club's decision, comes as the Nationals take a cautious approach with Strasburg's forearm. Though Strasburg has been able to throw on flat ground the last two days, the nerve impingement that caused...