Ryan Zimmerman

Ryan Zimmerman returned to the lineup for the Washington Nationals on Friday night, finished with the frustration of watching his team play without him. "It's tough," Zimmerman said. "Over the last three or four years, unfortunately, I've learned how to deal with that stuff a little better than I used to. " He went 0 for 4 with four strikeouts in a 3-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates. Zimmerman hopes to avoid another stint on the disabled list, a place he has been infuriatingly familiar with in recent seasons.

CLEVELAND — Gio Gonzalez was dominant again against the Cleveland Indians. It still wasn't enough to lift the Washington Nationals to a win. The problem for the Nationals on Friday night wasn't pitching it was their struggling offense that managed just two hits and scored its only run on a wild pitch. Despite Gonzalez pitching seven innings and giving up only one run and three hits, the Indians scored a run in the ninth for a 2-1 victory. Jason Kipnis' RBI fielder's choice scored...

Zimmerman says he'll return to majors Friday Third baseman Ryan Zimmerman said he will come off the disabled list Friday night in Pittsburgh after his left hamstring felt strong during a rehab assignment at Class A Potomac, giving the Nationals' struggling offense a boost. Zimmerman, who wore No. 33 in deference to Potomac's No. 11, shortstop Jason Martinson, played six innings, went 0 for 3 and reached on an error, running hard and without issue. In the field, Zimmerman fielded every ball within his reach and made two...

DENVER — The Washington Nationals' pitching staff is getting healthy, and with the way Ryan Zimmerman and Ian Desmond are hitting, the defending NL East champions are hitting their stride just as summer heats up. Zimmerman homered, doubled and drove in three runs, Desmond got four hits and the Nationals beat the depleted Colorado Rockies 5-4 on Thursday. Washington has been beset by injuries to its rotation, but with the return of starter Ross Detwiler on Thursday and Stephen Strasburg expected...

Let's pretend you are an unmarried ballplayer in your mid-20s, in the third year of a $45 million contract with a major league club. And, as part of that deal, your agent negotiated a clause in which you had full use of your home ballpark for one night a year. No men on base. No pressure to drive home a run. No consequences if you swing and miss. For one night, no umpires — you make the rules. You're single, rich and famous. What would you do? Whom would you invite? Would there be wine, women and song or...

Zimmerman, Espinosa are out of lineup Third baseman Ryan Zimmerman was out of Friday night's lineup against the Mets with tightness in his hamstring and second baseman Danny Espinosa remained on the bench for a fourth straight game with swelling in his right hand and wrist. Zimmerman suffered a cramp in his left hamstring last weekend against the Braves. He played with a heating pad affixed to his leg for several games, but he mildly aggravated the injury Wednesday night in Miami while he cut...

The Washington Nationals have missed their best player for more than two months. They've missed the buzz in the crowd when Ryan Zimmerman charges a slow-rolling groundball and whips a sidearm throw across the infield, the steadiness he provides in their clubhouse, the fear from the opposing dugout that he might walk to the plate in the ninth inning with the game in the balance. They are on the brink of having all of that for the first time in 58 games, but there is also...

MIAMI — A groundball to third base was, for years, the surest thing the Washington Nationals could count on. It put the game in the steady grip of Ryan Zimmerman — their best player, their Gold Glover, their rock. Zimmerman may still deliver the spectacular, and by virtue of his contributions and contract, he remains a foundational piece of the franchise. But when the ball bounds toward him now, certainty no longer travels with it. A team with no major perceived weaknesses entering the season,...

As Gio Gonzalez rears back for his historic first pitch Sunday, will there be anything more right in sports at that moment than Ryan Zimmerman playing in his first Major League Baseball playoff game? Imagine being one of the best Little Leaguers from your neighborhood, one of three kids from the same AAU youth baseball team to actually play in the big leagues. And while your childhood friends experienced the intoxicating rush of playoff baseball — playing in 62 combined...

Fans achieved a rare victory in the deal that will keep star third baseman Ryan Zimmerman with the Washington Nationals for most, if not all, of his career. Clearly, Zimmerman got the financial security and peace of mind he wanted — including another $100 million guaranteed and a full no-trade clause — to remain in Washington through at least the 2019 season. The Nationals scored a big public relations payoff while rewarding the face of their franchise. The win-win outcome for...

DENVER — The process of piecing this erratic Washington Nationals season back together may have begun in earnest here Thursday afternoon. Left-hander Ross Detwiler started a game for the first time in 29 days, with a nagging muscle strain in his side finally behind him. Stephen Strasburg's return is just days away , meaning the formidable rotation that was the basis for the season's high expectations will be reconstituted. In a 5-4 win that gave the...

WASHINGTON — Nationals manager Davey Johnson got what he wanted, a second consecutive rainout to give his battered team an extra day to heal. Maybe the mental break will turn out to be the catalyst the Nationals have been seeking. Certainly, nothing else has worked so far. The preseason NL East favorite remained one game below .500 Friday, when a series opener against the Minnesota Twins was postponed as rain from Tropical Storm Andrea moved north. The game will be...

WASHINGTON — Having stumbled home from a road trip and needing to make up ground in the NL East, the Washington Nationals welcomed back outfielder Jayson Werth among a half-dozen roster moves. The Nationals also made the long-delayed declaration Tuesday that second baseman Danny Espinosa needs some to time to heal and get his swing back. Werth was activated from the 15-day disabled list and was listed in the starting lineup, hitting second and playing right field...

BALTIMORE — History, it appeared, could safely take precedence. In the seventh inning, Ryan Zimmerman tucked his ash bat under his left armpit, tightened the Velcro straps of his gray batting gloves and stepped into the batter's box. Sixteen hitters in major league history had slugged four home runs in one game. Zimmerman, already history personified for the Washington Nationals , had the chance to become the 17th. The Nationals, it appeared, could bask in...

The Washington Nationals had shown signs of late that they might snap out of their season-long inconsistency. Their impotent offense put 42 runners on base in the previous three games, and though only a third of them scored, it was improvement. Perhaps a meeting with their regional American League foe, the Baltimore Orioles , on Monday and in front of a sellout crowd at Nationals Park would extend the revival. Instead, the 41,260 in attendance watched as Nationals silencer Jason Hammel yet...

What we have here is too much Natitude and not enough latitude. The Washington Nationals have pushed their chosen team identity of swagger, vast expectations, physical toughness and intensity bordering on mania to the danger point. What was beneficial last season is not always benign. They need to back off, before a season gets too damaged or somebody really gets hurt. On Sunday night, Ryan Mattheus broke his pitching hand in anger hitting his locker , the only thing in Petco Park...

Age is relative around a baseball clubhouse, and Ryan Zimmerman has lived inside one long enough to learn that. Put him anywhere else, and his youth is unmistakable. Put him around the Washington Nationals for more than six years, and his experience makes him an elder. "I'm the young old guy," Zimmerman said. " . . . Everyone is like, ‘Man, you've been playing forever. You must be like 30.' I'm like, ‘I'm 27. Thanks.' " Zimmerman arrived here Saturday for his seventh major...

Around 3:30 p.m. Tuesday, Ryan Zimmerman emerged from the dugout with a group of teammates, Michael Morse and Danny Espinosa among them, to take early batting practice under the supervision of Manager Davey Johnson and hitting coach Rick Eckstein. It's not something the Nationals' $100-million third baseman does often. But this .229 batting average isn't a normal slump. For so long, while the Nationals were at their worst, Zimmerman was at his best: a slick-fielding third baseman who could hit...

SAN FRANCISCO — The goal for the Washington Nationals remains unchanged, and if they overcome the bewildering first portion of their season to reach it, they may look back on Monday night and wonder: how did they ever get so lost on the way to the World Series? When the Nationals gathered in spring training and the baseball world anointed them favorites, they could not have envisioned something like the 8-0 slog they endured at the hands of the defending champion San Francisco Giants . Two long...