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WASHINGTON -- Bryce Harper knocked his one-liner as far out of the park as he did his monster home run into the third deck.I was just trying to impress the scouts, Harper said after the Washington Nationals beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 8-1 on Wednesday night.Well, almost as far. Harpers towering two-run home run traveled an estimated 449 feet off Bud Norris in the first inning, according to ESPN Stats & Information. It was one of the longest hit at Nationals Park.The reigning National League MVP took a 3-1 fastball from Norris and sent it over the Jackie Robinson sign on the facade in right. Harper said he was just trying to get a good swing on the ball and recalled former manager Matt Williams mantra of, Its not how far, its how many.But this one was far.He didnt miss that one, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. He tried to come up and in and just missed right around thigh high, and thats his nitro zone. Obviously a very good hitter like that, he can put a charge into it.As far as how many, Harper reached 20 home runs for the fourth time in five seasons. He later walked and scored on Wilson Ramos RBI double that was just one part of Washingtons offensive explosion.Ben Revere, Jayson Werth and Anthony Rendon also hit home runs and Trea Turner had an RBI triple and stole home for Washington, which snapped a six-game losing streak to Los Angeles dating to last season. Left-hander Gio Gonzalez (6-8) had one of his best starts of the season, allowing one run on three hits and striking out six in six innings.Manager Dusty Baker said Gonzalez was effectively wild and didnt have a lot of pressure because of the run support he got.Obviously youve got to tip your cap to our offense, Gonzalez said. These guys clobbered the ball today. And Norris wasnt that bad, either. He was out there pitching, attacking the strike zone. But our guys were just going out there, putting good wood on the ball and what a shot by Bryce.Other than Harpers home run, the Nationals were buzzing about Turners second triple in two nights and the speedy second basemans steal of home on a botched pickoff attempt in the sixth inning.It was a big play, Turner said. It was fun. It was exciting.It was an eventful but not so exciting night for Norris (5-8), who gave up six runs on seven hits in five-plus innings before giving way to the bullpen. He struck out eight as part of an inconsistent outing, and it didnt help that he allowed three home runs, including back-to-back from Revere and Werth in the fifth.That did us in right there, Roberts said of the back-to-back homers.TRAINERS ROOMDodgers: Roberts said surgery was more of a possibility for LHP Clayton Kershaw after a setback with the herniated disk in his back. ... LHP Alex Wood underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left elbow and is expected to miss eight weeks. ... Roberts said Corey Seager might be back in the lineup Thursday after missing two games with a stomach virus. ... RHP Chris Hatcher was placed on the disabled list with an oblique injury.Nationals: Rendon returned to the lineup after missing two games with the flu. ... INF Stephen Drew was out sick again. ... Baker said RHP Joe Ross (shoulder inflammation) and 1B Ryan Zimmerman (left rib cage sprain) will each go on a rehab assignment at some point.GLOVER LOVECalled up earlier in the day, RHP Koda Glover made his major league debut with a perfect ninth. Glover only needed four pitches to get through it.For the first time I was actually nervous, Glover said. I dont normally get nervous, but it definitely got the blood pumping.KENDRICK KEEPS IT ALIVEWith his double in the eighth, Dodgers LF Howie Kendrick extended his hitting streak to 12 games. A fly out left him stranded.UP NEXTNationals RHP Stephen Strasburg (13-0, 2.51 ERA) looks to continue his undefeated season against LHP Julio Urias (1-2, 4.95), who gets the ball for the injury-ravaged Dodgers in the series finale.Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. Cheap NFL Jerseys From China . Already owning gold from competition in Vancouver in 2010, Loch posted a combined four-run time of 3:27.526. That included a track-record third run of 51. NFL Jerseys China . Mickelson barely made the cut but had the best round of the day with nine birdies and an eagle coupled with two bogeys to sit two shots behind leader Craig Lee of Scotland. Lee shot a 69 for a 12-under 204 total. "I just love the fact I am in contention and have an opportunity in my first tournament of the year here in Abu Dhabi," Mickelson said. http://www.cheapchinawholesalenfljerseys.com/ . Dallas hasnt ruled out the star quarterback for Sunday nights game against Philadelphia, but all signs point to Romos back injury pushing Kyle Orton into the starting role after two years of limited play as the backup. Surely Ortons name isnt the first that comes to mind for fans wanting a change after years of damaging interceptions, fumbles or, most infamously, the field goal flub when Romo dropped the snap on a kick that could have won his first playoff game in 2006. Cheap NFL Jerseys . The Canadian squad, skipped by Jennifer Jones of Winnipeg, got on the board first with two in the second end, and followed that with two more apiece in the fourth and sixth ends. China NFL Wholesale .Y. -- Knicks coach Mike Woodson said Wednesday that J. Watch and read part one of the interview hereDoes the price tag in some way force selection? For instance, Pawan Negi in this IPL had a huge price tag and you had situations where you could not play him in the XI in some games. Youre trying to pick the best XI that works on that particular day, against that particular opposition, on that particular ground. You are not trying to pick people based on the money theyve got. In general, in a selection meeting we do not discuss what somebody has earned. A selection meeting is based on what a guy can offer, his form, his performances, does he fit into the team? At times you find there are good players who have to sit out.You might have come out of an auction with clear areas or holes in your team that you have got to fill, and then youre trying to mix and match and sometimes good players miss out. And there are other players who are lesser in terms of international experience or lesser in terms of current performance in domestic cricket that dont actually get a chance to play, and thats difficult for them, and I can understand that. Its an opportunity for them to further their careers, both in terms of selection and also financially. Its a big tournament and if some of them dont get an opportunity, it can lead to frustration, and thats natural.Arent you now picking XIs based on what you anticipate situations to be and how players will respond to those situations? In the past youve had to rotate players, give them certain roles they may not have been used to. For instance, you asked Brad Hodge to bat lower down the order [at Rajasthan Royals]. Tactics have evolved and people are now picking different kinds of players and theyre not just picking players based on reputation. Youre seeing players being picked based on what they bring to the team.Each of those strategies will be based on the team you have. Hodges role is not a trade secret. Hodge batted lower down the order in that team because we didnt have a gun Indian batsman at that stage. We had Ajinkya Rahane, who was still a developing young player at that stage, but he is clearly more a top-order player. Someone like a Brad Hodge can play that role. There could be another team where Brad Hodge might have been more valuable at the top of the order.Data is a very important aspect of the game in T20. Is that significantly different to how youve seen it in the other formats of the game? I think datas growing in every format of the game. People are coming up with new metrics to view things. A lot of it is really useful. But its how you read that data. I think thats the game changer. Thats where the skills of the coaches come in.A particular batsman faces three dot balls and youre aware then, from the data that youve collected, that he has a particular get-out-of-jail shot. Lets assume its over cows corner. Are you down to that level of strategising? Sometimes we get caught up about tactics and strategy and we forget that the most important thing actually is execution. I always like to use the example of Lasith Malinga. He is a great example of someone, when you were facing him, you knew exactly which ball he was going to bowl at the back end of an innings. Millions of people watching on TV know which ball he was going to bowl. If he executed it brilliantly, like he did most times, theres nothing you can do. Can you execute that particular ball that youre asked to do? Sometimes people ask, Oh what is that tactic? Sometimes the tactic and the strategy is not wrong; its the execution thats wrong and a lot of times people get confused with that.We are hearing a lot more about head-to-head contests in T20s. Is that also a part of your scenario, picking players for particular players? You could, in certain cases, and Chris Gayle is a good example. People have in the past used offspinners against him a lot but if Royal Challengers Bangalore open with either [AB] de Villiers or [Virat] Kohli, youve got to counter that as well. I think it happened in a game in Bangalore where R Ashwin didnt actually bowl an over, or he bowled an over very late in the innings because Gayle had got out and then they had a string of right-handers and maybe the situation didnt come up. I think the teams that win are the ones that have the best balance. They have the ability to play every situation and in all conditions. They are not reliant only on certain things panning out for them to be able to use certain players.Whats your sense of how much batting has developed in T20 cricket? I think batting has the freedom to develop. We are more accepting of failure in T20 cricket than we are in any other form of the game. When a batsman takes risks and plays a paddle sweep or a reverse sweep, youre more likely to view it with a certain degree of acceptability than you would in a Test match or one-day match. If you keep practising something, you are going to get better at it. AB de Villiers has had nine IPLs now - think of the amount of batting opportunities he has had to experiment with this. Hes got gifts that other people dont have, but hes also had so many opportunities to fail, to learn from them and to keep refining his batting technique for T20. People have been allowed to take few more risks.Are power-hitters more valuable in a T20 sett-up than the conventional batsmen? Of course they are, which is why a lot of the West Indian players are so valuable in an IPL because they are able to play the kind of shots that are not easy for others to hit.dddddddddddd The West Indian team of this World T20 was a brilliant T20 team because it had batting so deep, with power-hitters who could change the course of the game from No. 2 to 8. Its not easy to accomplish that for every other team, especially in the IPL teams for certain because no ones going to allow you to pick eight power-hitters.It is almost sacrilege to start suggesting that players like Virat Kohli or David Warner, while extremely valuable for their teams, may not be quite as valuable as these dynamic power-hitters, who can actually turn the game on its head. And if youve got a team loaded with a few of those, you have a greater chance of success? If your dynamic power-hitter can score 900 runs for you, then yes, but not all dynamic power-hitters can score, which is why Chris Gayle has been one of the most dominant T20 players for a long time because he scores as many runs as he does, at a great rate. These are not easy skills to obtain - consistency as well as power-hitting, and the ability to negotiate pace, spin. Its not like there are many players around who can do all of these things. Theres no way that the talents and the abilities of a David Warner or a Virat Kohli are ever going to go extinct.Is the concept of the par score in T20 changing? I think the batsmen are slightly ahead of the bowlers in terms of the way their skills have improved over the last 9-11 years in T20 cricket, but the bowlers are slowly catching up. We find bowlers coming up with new skills and strategies to counter some of these batsmen. Mustafizur [Rahman] was excellent in this [IPL] tournament. The nature of bowling is such that youre limited physically by the amount you can do. Batsmen can set up bowling machines to mimic certain kinds of balls and you can go on practising. They have a little leeway. You cant obviously go on bowling for two hours every day because youre going to get injured.In terms of embracing innovation, are young batsmen now more accepting of it? When youre growing up, youre a product of the environment you are in, and the environment that a lot of them are in is one where they grow up watching their heroes play these shots. So its only natural that they will take what they have seen the night before and go to their summer camps and try that. You see more and more batsmen today being fearless about the risks they want to take, being more innovative and more creative.How much has captaincy in T20 evolved with time, and is it the most challenging form of the game in which to captain? Because of the nature of the game, one decision to give somebody the ball could actually cost you a game, whereas in a Test or one-day match, you have an opportunity to come back. Sometimes at the back end of a game, you are weighing your options and you get one of those decisions wrong, and sometimes its not even a wrong decision, and thats why I think in T20 cricket it goes down to execution. You have to make decisions a lot quicker, be very flexible. You have to be quick on your feet and clear in your thinking - you cant get muddled. You cant afford to get rattled because the ball is flying all over the place, and its the captains who can actually just hold their own in that kind of situation that are the ones who end up being successful. In a T20 scenario theres more input possibly because the coach/mentor is right there in the dugout. What sort of dynamic does that create? Does the captain want all that input or is he almost shooing you away? Thats unique to different players and different captains. Some captains might like some conversation, some captains might not. I think its just the dynamic of the team, the way its structured, the kind of information the captain is looking at.You have the strategic time-out, where you are actually allowed on to the field to offer inputs. In the strategic time-out you dont get in the way and confuse them even more. Its again something thats very unique to this format and sometimes just to bounce off a few ideas of the captain. Sometimes you realise how different you might be thinking but its the guy on the ground who finally makes a decision, and he should be given the right to make that decision.Where do you see T20 headed over the next two or three years? I think T20 cricket is only going to get bigger and bigger. We need to be a bit careful that we maintain the balance between bat and ball. I see that as one of the major challenges of T20 cricket. What we dont want is for every score to become a 200-plus score, where its always about power-hitting skills. We want to bring the skills of cricket. You want somebody to negotiate a difficult spell, the turning ball, and see if he can score at seven-eight runs an over against a good spinner. I think otherwise you just might put up bowling machines and see who hits it further.Watch ESPNcricinfo Talking Cricket at 9.30pm IST on Fridays and the repeat at noon on Sundays on SONYESPN ' ' '