Nats grab quick 2-0 lead over Pirates (Nats win 5-2)

Doug Fister will take the mound today with a 2-0 lead, after the Nationals picked up a couple of runs early against Pirates lefty Francisco Liriano.

Not all of the offense was, well, a result of the Nats' bats, but for a team struggling to score runs, who's going to complain?

Denard Span started things off with a leadoff double and Anthony Rendon worked a walk. After Jayson Werth struck out, the Nats got a break when Adam LaRoche hit what normally would have been a double play ball into the shift only to have the Pirates manage only one out on the play.

Liriano uncorked a wild pitch to score Span and Ian Desmond followed with a run-scoring single.

Update: Fister is cruising through three innings, which probably shouldn't be a surprise considering that he came into today's game having allowed only two earned runs in 13 innings over his career at PNC Park. In that span, he'd struck out 19.

Players in the Pirates' starting lineup entered the game with a collective .385 (10-for-26) against Fister, who has yielded one hit and fanned three today.

Update II: The lead is up to 4-0, thanks to Rendon and another wild pitch.

Span doubled to lead off the fifth and scored when Rendon tripled off the wall in right-center. Rendon came home later in the inning when Liriano threw another wild pitch.

Scoring four runs is important. When they reach that threshold, the Nationals are 20-1.

Update III: Josh Harrison's solo homer leading off the sixth cut the lead to 4-1, and Fister is now out of the game after giving up singles to Neil Walker, who was erased on Andrew McCutchen's fielder's choice, and Ike Davis.

Fister went 5 1/3 innings, allowing a run on five hits, walking none and striking out four. He threw 83 pitches, 57 for strikes.

Righty Craig Stammen is on, and needed only one pitch to induce Starling Marte to hit into a 5-3 double play to end the inning.

Guess manager Matt Williams didn't want a repeat of yesterday, when Stephen Strasburg tired quickly in the seventh, allowing the Pirates to rally for the victory.

Update IV: We're done the top of the seventh, and the Nats have increased their lead to 5-1, thanks to what first appeared to be a fantastic diving catch in right by Harrison that was overturned on replay, turning a sac fly by Ian Desmond into a run-scoring single.

With one out, Werth and LaRoche singled off Vin Mazzaro, putting runners on the corners. Up came Desmond, whose fly ball down the right field line appeared to be grabbed by Harrison, allowing Werth to trot home with the fifth run.

But replays clearly showed that Harrison dropped the ball on his slide, and Williams challenged the call and won a reversal. The runners were placed at first and second, exposing one of the problems with the expanded replay system: What happens when an out is turned into a hit?

Update V: The Pirates got an RBI single by Ike Davis, but Aaron Barrett fanned Marte with runners on the corners for the final out of the eighth. It's 5-2 Nats heading to the ninth, and only three outs separate them from the end of a four-game skid.

Update VI: Soriano closed it out for his 11th save and the Nats have a 5-2 victory.