Zimmerman, Murphy on squelched eighth-inning comeback attempt

BALTIMORE - The opener between the Nationals and the Orioles slowed down a bit after Baltimore jumped out to a 4-2 lead after four innings.

Danny Espinosa inched the Nationals closer with a solo shot in the seventh to cut the lead to 4-3 Orioles.

Then in the eighth, the Nationals looked to accomplish something that has been difficult for many teams this season: try to find a way to solve right-hander Brad Brach.

Daniel Murphy led off the inning with a double versus Orioles left-hander Donnie Hart. But Bryce Harper's comebacker to Hart caught Murphy off of the bag, and suddenly there was one away.

Murphy described the play simply enough.

"Bryce hit one to the pitcher, and then he threw me out at second," Murphy said.

But the 25-year-old Hart said he had noticed a possible tendency watching video of Murphy. In previous games with the same situation, Hart saw that Murphy sometimes moved off second and headed to third on comebackers to the pitcher.

Hart told reporters that if he saw a similar play happen in front of him, he would check Murphy. Hart said, sure enough when he fielded the ball, Murphy had his head down heading to third base, and he was able to freeze him and throw him out at second.

In came Brach.

Harper managed to get to second when he was called safe on a 6-4-3 grounder off the bat of Wilson Ramos.

Anthony Rendon, who had homered in the fourth, walked to put two men on with two outs.

A wild pitch got Harper to third and Rendon to second. Suddenly, the tying run was 90 feet away and the go-ahead run was at second base for the Nationals.

Ryan Zimmerman stayed alive by fouling off three Brach four-seam fastballs. But on a 2-2 count, Brach brought the 89 mph splitter, and Zimmerman swung and missed to end the rally. The Orioles eventually won.

Zimmerman described his first-ever meeting against Brach.

"It's tough coming (into a) situation like that when (you've) never really seen a guy throw a pitch," Zimmerman said. "Especially a guy like that that's having the year that he's having. But I fought off a couple of good pitches and then he made a really good pitch, that last pitch. Just a split that started right at the bottom of the zone and fell out. Got to give him credit, he made a good pitch on me."

Manager Dusty Baker agreed with Zimmerman on the first-time matchup against Brach.

"We were threatening in the eighth," Baker said. "We had the tying and the winning run on base. But another guy we hadn't seen, he made a good pitch on Zim."

Murphy earned his 48th multi-hit game of the season, but of course didn't want to be caught off second base to start the rally in the eighth. He appreciated what Zimmerman did to stay alive in the at-bat, but also felt Rendon's at-bat was key against a pitcher like Brach.

"It was a great at-bat," Murphy said. "I thought Tony had a great at-bat as well. Willie hit the ball hard when Bryce was on the move right there. Just couldn't quite catch them tonight unfortunately."