Three tense and tightly contested games yielded two road wins for the Nationals in Chicago, thanks to surprising late-inning magic. Call them the "Comeback Kids," the "Cardiac Kids" or whatever you will, but the Nationals scored nine times in the last two innings during the three-game set in the Windy City. The late heroics produced both wins and they almost pulled off a third Sunday for what would have been a sweep. Keeping Kerry Wood out of Sunday's game may have been the difference...

I don't even remember a winning season. Ever since I became a fan of the Orioles and of baseball in general, I have watched the team play to a sub-.500 record. The last time they had a winning season, it was 1997, and I was much too young to process or remember it. However, the game is so much more than wins and losses. While obviously I will be completely enthralled when the team makes it into a pennant race, I still am just as loyal today as I will be when that day comes. And to be an...

CHICAGO - Before I take off on my super-early flight from the Windy City to the City That Never Sleeps, I wanted to kick off a feature that I hope to post every Monday morning during the season called Clubhouse Cliff Notes. Since it would be both impossible and completely unnecessary to post every single quote I get from players in my pregame, in-game and postgame entries, I figured this would be a way for me to pass along some of the best soundbites from the last week that have fallen through...

For the first time since he gave up six runs against the Detroit Tigers last Sept. 25, Brian Matusz will take a major league mound tonight, in a game that counts, to begin to try and finally erase, once and for all, the memory of his terrible 2011 season. Matusz put in some hard work during the offseason after going 1-9 with an ERA of 10.69 in 12 big league starts last season. He gave up six runs or more in seven of his last eight starts then. His ERA in September was 19.13. But after a...

The last time that the Yankees and Red Sox started out 0-3 was 1966. Anyone know how the Orioles finished that year? I'm not ordering my playoff tickets quite yet. The Orioles were 3-0 last season. They also were 6-1. Fast starts aren't a novelty. The issue has been sustaining that momentum. I know they beat up on the Twins, who did everything well over the weekend except pitch, hit and field, but don't ruin the moment. I've said the same thing in previous years. Why overthink it when...

CHICAGO - Here's the line that John Lannan put up during his brief debut for Triple-A Syracuse against Scranton/Wilkes-Barre this evening: Two innings, five earned runs, six hits, two walks and one strikeout. Not a great start to the year, and not exactly the type of performance you want to turn in when you're trying to improve your trade value. Jordan Zimmermann, however, delivered a fine first outing of 2012, going seven innings, allowing two runs (one earned) on six hits with no walks...

Nationals left fielder Michael Morse continued on the road to recovery with another outstanding day at the plate Sunday as the Double-A Harrisburg Senators downed the Bowie Baysox, 5-2. Morse smacked a two-run double and finished 1-for-2 with a walk and three RBIs as the designated hitter. He finished with a .375 average over the four games at Bowie. Meanwhile, Rick Ankiel played center field and went 0-for-2 with a run scored and a walk, batting .333 over the series. Morse can return as...

CHICAGO - All spring, we heard Jayson Werth talk about how confident he was feeling at the plate. We heard manager Davey Johnson say he was seeing a major difference in Werth this year, not only during Grapefruit League games, but even during batting practice. Through the season's first three regular season games, the results just haven't been there for the Nationals right fielder. And his stat line doesn't look too pretty. In the three contests at Wrigley Field, Werth went 0-for-10 with...

CHICAGO - Jeff Samardzija pumped his fastball in at up to 98 mph, located a hard, biting slider on the corners and mixed in some quality changeups down in the zone. Making just his sixth career start, the Cubs righty had Nationals hitters guessing all afternoon, and allowed just one run until Adam LaRoche's two-run home run in the ninth inning made it a 4-3 game. By then, it was too late for another comeback, and led by Samardzija, the Cubs snuck out of Wrigley with a one-run win. Davey...

Here are comments from Orioles catcher Matt Wieters and pitching coach Rick Adair on Jason Hammel's near no-hitter today at Camden Yards. Wieters on Hammel's outing: "He threw the ball well. He was able to get a lot of ground balls and use all his offspeed. In spring training, you could tell he had good stuff, but you are always constantly working on things. He did a great job of pitching to his strengths and getting a lot of groundballs. I thought we had a chance today with the stuff he...