Gonzalez surprisingly happy, Werth hits for first time this spring

VIERA, Fla. - Nationals manager Matt Williams has seen enough of injuries lately, so there was some immediate cause for concern in the third inning of today's game at Space Coast Stadium when starting pitcher Gio Gonzalez landed awkwardly after jumping and attempting to reach a hard hit ball by the Marlins' Marcell Ozuna.

Williams and Nats pitching coach Steve McCatty immediately came out of the dugout to check on Gonzalez.

"I tried to do the jump man logo and catch the ball in the end zone but other than that it was just a little burn in the knee and felt fine," said Gonzalez.

"Came down funny. Don't need any more of those right now," said Williams.

Gonzalez stayed in the game for one more batter before being removed for pitch total reasons.

Gonzalez was upbeat about his performance, despite giving up four runs on four hits with two walks and two strikeouts. He threw 52 pitches, 35 for strikes.

"Fastball looked like it was jumping out of the hand, curveball was landing for strikes, changeup was down in the strike zone," he said. "There were certain things Loby (Jose Lobaton) and I were discussing on certain pitches, but that's the beauty of spring training: You got time to adjust, time to work and I like the way I attacked the strike zone, pounded it and kept working. Everything Loby put down, we were working on those pitches. He started picking up early on them too in the second inning."

The lefty was most upset about the two walks he delivered in the third inning, saying he needs to focus on getting ahead of hitters early in the count.

His manager agreed.

"If he commands early then he gets early aggressive swings," said Williams. "The reason for that is nobody wants to get to his breaking ball because it's a good one. His changeup was really good last year. So if he gets strikes in early counts then he gets earlier swings and it allows him to go deeper in games."

The usually colorful Gonzalez says he's in a good position mentally and physically after dealing with shoulder issues that bothered him for most of last season.

"Two starts down, my arm feels fantastic. Strength in the arm feels great, body feels great," he said. "I feel like I'm back in 2012 just having fun smiling. I think that our rotation does that now even with the addition of Max Scherzer. Just keeping it great. You can hear from our clubhouse, even when we're down we're still up. We're just happy, we're smiling, we're picking each other up and I think that's how I feel now. My body feels great. I can't complain the way I'm feeling right now. I feel like I'm on cloud nine right now."

Left fielder Jayson Werth has been taking dry swings for the past two weeks, but actually put bat to ball today for the first time while doing what Williams called some light work in the cage. Williams plans to increase Werth's participation significantly next week. Werth is recovering from January shoulder surgery.

"At some point, we'll get him into some games to just play defense," said Williams. "We got to get his legs underneath him. That'll probably take place on the minor league side where we control things so he doesn't have to have to come up and try to throw somebody out. That'll kind of be the next step as we go through his process to get him in some game situations so he can go through that normal soreness that everybody's goes through in spring."

Outfielder Nate McLouth, also recovering from shoulder surgery, was a late scratch for today's split-squad game against the Mets in Port St. Lucie. Williams said McLouth was just sore after his throwing program yesterday. Williams doesn't expect the outfielder to miss any additional time.

In the loss to the Mets, third baseman Ian Stewart homered for the second straight day. He's now batting .400 (6-for-15) this spring.

Max Scherzer makes his third start of the exhibition season tomorrow as the Nationals take on the Astros in Kissimmee.