From the start of spring training, Nationals manager Davey Johnson preached patience. Henry Rodriguez, who led the league in wild pitches in 2011 and managed to throw 10 in 29 1/3 innings of work in 2012, continued his wild ways this spring, but the Nats' 70-year-old skipper said it was just a matter of time before the right-handed reliever figured things out. Rodriguez's 2012 campaign saw him temporarily assume the closer's role and save nine games before flaming out rather quickly and...

Could the umpiring have been any worse last night? Not to mention the official scorer. OK, I just mentioned him. You know it's bad when a pitching coach, in this case Oakland's Curt Young, comes out of the dugout for a mound visit and instead yells at the first base umpire, who ejected him. Young never did talk to Jarrod Parker. I hadn't seen that happen before last night. Did it count as a mound visit? Brian Matusz never made it to the mound last night. Two other left-handers, Troy...

Nate McLouth stole two more bases for the Orioles in the series-opening game at Oakland on Thursday night. He now has seven steals on the year in eight attempts. McLouth is tied for second in the AL right now with those seven steals with Oakland's Coco Crisp, trailing only Jacoby Ellsbury of Boston with 10. At that pace, he would steal 51 bases this season. The club record is 57 by Luis Aparicio in 1964. While McLouth may not keep up this pace or threaten Aparicio's single-season record,...

Coming into this season, what type of team did you envision the 2013 Washington Nationals being? You probably didn't see the Nats hitting a collective .235 or getting on base at a .299 clip. I'm guessing you didn't see them leading the majors in errors and sitting dead last in fielding percentage. There's a good chance you didn't see the reigning National League East champions ranking in the bottom half of the league in team ERA. Yet entering last night's ballgame, that's where the...

Jason Hammel picked up his third win. Chris Davis hit his eighth homer with two RBIs, while Nick Markakis and Nate McLouth drove in two runs each tonight as the Orioles beat Oakland 10-2 in the opener of a four-game series. The win was impressive for a few reasons: * It started badly for the Orioles, who allowed two unearned runs to fall behind 2-0 in the second inning. That inning saw J.J. Hardy and Manny Machado both commit errors and Adam Jones misplay a fly ball into a double. The...

Jason Hammel was at 80 pitches through five innings tonight. Seemed like a pretty good bet to become the first Orioles starter to make it through the seventh. Not anymore. Hammel needed 24 pitches to complete the sixth and strand two runners. That's 104 pitches. Manager Buck Showalter shook Hammel's hand in the dugout. It's up to the bullpen now - except for closer Jim Johnson, who has pitched in three straight games and needs a break. Hammel threw 113 pitches in his last start against...

The Orioles' streak of 17 consecutive extra-inning victories ended with Wednesday's 6-5 loss to Toronto. The Orioles matched the 1949 Cleveland Indians for most consecutive extra-inning victories in major league history. I reviewed the box scores from all 17 games and came away with the following facts and figures: * The average number of innings played per game during the streak fell just shy of 12 (11.82352941176471, to be exact). The longest game of the streak by innings played was 18...

No need for anyone to get Danny Espinosa any birthday gifts. He gave himself the best present he could ask for tonight. On his 26th birthday, Espinosa delivered two clutch knocks, helping power the Nationals to a much-needed 8-1 win over the Reds. "I always feel like during the season I typically struggle on my birthday," Espinosa said. "In the minors, I was always hot in the first month, and my birthday would come around and I'd suck on a big 0-for-4." Not tonight. Tonight, Espinosa...

Manager Davey Johnson has harped on it the last couple of starts for his top-of-the-rotation guys. Stephen Strasburg and Thursday's starter, Gio Gonzalez, have been unable to consistently get ahead early in at-bats at the start of games. It has ended up hurting their results. They began the season a combined 2-5. Last season, they combined for 36 wins. On Wednesday, Strasburg failed to get a strike on the first pitch in the first frame. The Cardinals put up three runs on three hits and went...

While Davey Johnson might not enjoy having to sit down with reporters and answer questions about his team's performance after every single game, you can bet that experience was a bit easier to take tonight than it had been the last four days. Johnson's Nationals smacked 12 hits and picked up an 8-1 win over the Reds tonight, snapping a four-game losing streak and getting back on track after what had been a fairly trying week for the guys in the Nats' clubhouse. "Real satisfying," Johnson...