Jayson Werth is in the clubhouse and it looks like he could be activated prior to tonight's game. No move has been announced yet, but we're waiting on word. Werth could return in time to face his former team before the Phillies leave town tonight. Update: Werth is currently shagging flies in center field during batting practice. Davey Johnson's pregame session with reporters has been pushed back at least 45 minutes and we're still waiting on a lineup for tonight. Meanwhile, two...

Chris Tillman stepped to the mound in the bottom of the first inning after watching his counterpart, Ivan Nova, retire the Orioles on six pitches. Tillman proceeded to give up five runs, including a Robinson Cano two-run job, before the Orioles' seats were even warm. It appeared it would be another long night. As the second inning started, Adam Jones and Matt Wieters both got on board with singles. Wilson Betemit and Lew Ford were set down by strikeouts and Nova quickly put two strikes on...

The Orioles' first-round draft pick, LSU pitcher Kevin Gausman, is expected to soon join the short-season Single-A Aberdeen IronBirds and will make his pro debut Monday. Gausman will pitch three innings that night for Aberdeen at State College and is expected to make six starts of three innings each for the IronBirds from now through the end of their season on September 5. Gausman will fly to Birmingham, Ala., tomorrow to undergo biomechanical testing and then he will leave Birmingham to...

These days, you rarely ever see a pitcher involved in a play at the plate when he's the guy barreling towards home trying to score. Teams seem to go out of their way to protect their hurlers, and that generally includes avoiding situations in which the pitcher might be forced to lay a shoulder into a catcher or somehow end up contorting his body in an attempt to touch home plate safely. That's why it was a little strange to see Nationals third base coach Bo Porter wave Edwin Jackson home...

A good team, a winning team, is made up of a couple types of players. These are stars and role players. The guys that play their roles will never get as much credit as the Ryan Zimmerman, Bryce Harper, Stephen Strasburg or Gio Gonzalez-type players, but they are equally important to any winning team, and at 62-41 that is what the Nationals are. One of the more overlooked roles is long relief. These are the pitchers whose chief duty is to come into a game when it is getting out of hand and to...

It is a question that has dogged the Orioles organization for years and still does to this day: Why can't the Orioles develop young pitchers? Among Jake Arrieta, Brian Matusz, Zach Britton and Chris Tillman, it seems Tillman is currently the most promising of the four - and he was at Triple-A for most of this year. Arrieta is 26, but his ERA has gone from 4.66 in 2010 to 5.05 last year and now is 6.13. That is going the wrong way and Arrieta is now back at Triple-A. I remember how well he...

Jayson Werth is another step closer to returning to the Nationals following another successful rehab stint. Werth led off and played center field for high Single-A Potomac in its game versus the Salem Red Sox on Wednesday night in Woodbridge, Va. The game was called due to rain in the ninth inning. The game will be resumed at 5:05 p.m. Thursday with the score tied at 3-3 in the bottom of the ninth. Werth was 2-for-3 with a run scored and a walk in four plate appearances. "I felt good,"...

The Phillies hit so many balls hard off Edwin Jackson tonight that the Nationals starter initially thought he might have been tipping his pitches. After going back and watching some film, Jackson shot down that theory. He came away from that mini film session with a new idea of why he surrendered three home runs and gave up eight hits over 5 2/3 innings. "I just got hurt on balls up in the zone," Jackson said. Yeah, that'll usually do it. "Got behind in some counts," Jackson...

NEW YORK - Just when it appears that the Orioles' rotation and roster are settled, at least for the short term, more rumblings can be heard from miles away. Sort of like Sidney Ponson with an empty stomach. We don't know whether left-hander Zach Britton will make his next start. We don't know whether Tommy Hunter will start on Friday, though he's scheduled to open the three-game series against the Rays. The entire rotation will be working on an extra days rest because of today's open...

In the 18 innings played so far in this series, the Nationals have scored just two runs off Phillies pitching. Think they miss Ryan Zimmerman, who has been out of the starting lineup for both of these games because of a back injury? The Nats dropped their second straight contest to the rival Phils tonight, this one by a 3-2 score. Phillies starter Vance Worley held the Nationals to just two runs (both unearned) on six hits over his seven innings of work. He walked just one and needed only 86...