NATIONALS QUICK WRAP
Score: Nats 3, Braves 1
Recap: Gio González battled his way out of a first-inning jam and finished strong during a 4 1/3-inning start. The left-hander allowed one run (Tyler Flowers' homer in the fourth), threw 76 pitches and now has a 1.10 ERA in five spring appearances. Wilmer Difo's sacrifice fly in the bottom of the second gave the Nationals their first run of the afternoon. Back-to-back doubles by Emmanuel Burriss and Pedro Severino, followed by a Clint Robinson single, produced two more runs in the seventh.
Need to know: Ryan Zimmerman had two more hits and a bullet of a lineout to center field to continue his late-spring surge. After going 0-for-17 to begin play this month, he's now 10-for-16 since. ... Enny Romero, making his first appearance since rejoining the club from the World Baseball Classic, hit 96 mph on the radar gun during a 13-pitch scoreless inning of relief. ... Max Scherzer is scheduled to make his first Grapefruit League start of the spring Wednesday.
On deck: Wednesday vs. Cardinals in Jupiter, 1:05 p.m.
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WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Gio González wasn't as sharp today as he was in his last outing, but he was good enough to emerge with another positive start in an impressive spring.
González allowed one run on three hits in 4 1/3 innings against the Braves, serving up Tyler Flowers' solo homer in the fourth but also retiring eight consecutive batters at one point.
The Nationals left-hander got into a top-of-the-first jam via a walk, a hit batter and a single. But he pitched his way out of it, escaping the inning on 21 pitches. That started his streak of retired batters, which included five straight groundouts to shortstop Wilmer Difo.
González's one real mistake came on the home run, a 2-2 fastball that Flowers sent soaring into the berm beyond the fence in left-center. But he rebounded from that and finished strong, returning to the mound for the top of the fifth to face one final batter and build his pitch count up to 76.
This didn't match González's last start when he tossed five hitless innings on 49 pitches, but it continued his strong spring. The lefty now sports a 1.10 ERA in five Grapefruit League starts, allowing only eight hits in 16 1/3 innings and never issuing more than one walk per outing.
The Nationals got on the board first with some well-struck balls in the bottom of the second. After Ryan Zimmerman legged out an infield single, Stephen Drew drove a ball over the right fielder's outstretched glove for a double and Difo sent another fly ball to the warning track in right to bring home the run.
Zimmerman added a line drive single to right in the fourth, his 10th hit in his last 14 at-bats. The veteran first baseman, who opened the spring in an 0-for-17 slump, now owns a .323 batting average.