Shuffle Up, We'll Deal

Boy, have we got moves:

Cristian Guzman to the DL with a strained ligament in his left thumb. He injured it in a tag play. (Did you notice the one throw -- can't remember who it was on -- where he sorta soft tossed the ball to first on a close play?)

D'Angelo Jimenez gets the callup in his place. Jimenez batted a sterling .071 in 14 ABs earlier this season, as one of the primary PHers. Jiminez went to the minors a few weeks ago, and was a monster for Columbus, batting .368 with 22 extra-base hits. Second time's the charm? Svrluga says that FLop slides to short, and Belliard gets the nod at second.

Jason Bergmann was activated from the DL. He starts against Atlanta tonight. He's made Atlanta his [offensive word] this year, allowing just 1 run in 14 innings, while striking out 18. Given Atlanta's recent offensive struggles -- including a 31-inning scoreless streak and one run in the last five combined-- and their infighting, it couldn't be a better situation.

To make room, the Nats sent down Chris Schroder.

But then Jesus Colome came down with the mysterious "soft tissue infection in a right lower extremity.", and Schroder was recalled.

Anyone wanna take a guess at what the infection is, and what it's inflicting? Someone spending too much time late night on Mass. Ave? Justin Maxwell just paid a visit to the team, and he's on the DL with a staph infection. Hmmm... Maybe Maxwell was demonstrating the latest poultry insemination techniques?

And if Jimbo's itchy transactin' finger wasn't twitching enough, he traded Darnell McDonald, a 28-year old outfielder to the Twins for the rights to Levale Speigner. Speigner remains Nats property, free of the Rule 5 restrictions. There's some potential in there, but he really needs more work. None of his pitches were individually impressive. More consistent work, without fear of having his brains beaten in every time, could help him there.