First baseman Adam LaRoche would be the first to admit the last couple of weeks have not been very much fun for him at the plate. Heading into Thursday's game against Colorado, LaRoche was batting .156 (5-for-32) in those past 10 games. Manager Davey Johnson sensed his veteran was scuffling a bit at the plate and gave him Monday's game at Philadelphia off. He did have a pinch-hit at-bat in that game, but went 0-for-1. Now, in his last three starts, he has six hits. Thursday was the best of...

In his eight innings of work tonight, Jordan Zimmermann got into very little trouble. He allowed just two runners to get into scoring positing through the seventh and set down 16 straight hitters at one point. Zimmermann was cruising, pounding the strike zone and setting down the Rockies with relative ease. In the eighth, the right-hander finally needed to work his way out of a jam, albeit one that was partially created by some shaky defense. After Zimmermann walked Josh Rutledge with one...

The Orioles tonight have agreed to signing bonus terms with their top draft pick, high school pitcher Hunter Harvey, MASNsports.com has learned. The 22nd overall pick in the draft, it is believed Harvey's deal is around the slot value for that pick of $1,947,600. Harvey is expected to take a physical early next week to make the deal official. Harvey is a right-hander from Bandys High School in Catawba, N.C., and was rated by Baseball America as the 33rd-best overall player and the...

Two of Ian Desmond's last three swings have resulted in home runs. Last night, Desmond led the Nationals to a 6-2 win with an 11th-inning grand slam. Tonight, Desmond launched a 1-1 changeup from Roy Oswalt into the left field seats in the second inning to give the Nats a 1-0 lead over the Rockies. Desmond now has 11 homers on the season, third-most among major league shortstops and second-most on the Nats behind Bryce Harper, who has 12. Desmond also leads all active shortstops in...

Manager Davey Johnson had injury updates for catcher Wilson Ramos and right-handed pitcher Ryan Mattheus. Ramos has been on the disabled list since May 16 with a hamstring injury. He had a setback last week running the bases but Johnson said the catcher is making better progress this week. "I keep reading the reports every day that he is catching bullpens, taking batting practice, he is running the bases," Johnson said. "We are just being very cautious because he was injured a second time...

Barring any setbacks with his injured left knee, Bryce Harper should be back playing rehab games sometime in the near future. Nationals manager Davey Johnson said today that Harper, who is dealing with bursitis in his knee, did some running in the outfield at Nats Park today and will do some hitting in the cages. As long as Harper's knee doesn't swell up tomorrow, Johnson believes that the Nationals outfielder could head out on a rehab assignment soon. "I talked to Bryce, he looked...

Orioles left-hander Wei-Yin Chen completed three innings today in a simulated game in Sarasota and remains on schedule to return to Baltimore next week. Chen threw 42 pitches, 27 for strikes. He threw all of his pitches, as he did in his second bullpen session on Monday. "He looks good," said Scott McGregor, the Orioles' pitching rehab coordinator. "It was a good test for him today. He threw all of them and looked pretty comfortable." Chen will throw another bullpen session on Saturday...

The Nationals will go with the same lineup in today's series opener against the Rockies that they ran out last night against the Phillies. With Roger Bernadina still dealing with some type of issue with his left eye, Steve Lombardozzi will play left field again tonight. Bernadina was scratched from last night's game due to the eye, which Bernadina said was bothering him when he woke up yesterday morning. Johnson had hoped to have Bernadina in the lineup today because he's hitting .353 with...

Double-A Harrisburg right-hander Taylor Jordan won his sixth straight Eastern League game Wednesday in a 3-1 win at Bowie. Going eight innings, Jordan demonstrated again he has the stuff to get batters out. But critical to his maturation at this level is also the mental side of the game and Jordan is having success keeping himself focused and on target. Harrisburg pitching coach Paul Menhart referred to Jordan's biggest attributes as "his ability to slow the game down." This is a very...

Former big league pitcher Bryan Harvey said reports that his son Hunter is on the verge of signing with the Orioles are accurate. "It is getting real close," Bryan Harvey said in a phone conversation. The Orioles drafted Hunter Harvey with the 22nd pick in round one on June 6. Could this deal get finalized today? "I hope so," Bryan Harvey said. "That comes as great news. Soon he can go play baseball." Harvey would not say exactly what is left to complete to get the deal to an...