The Braves used a single by Matt Diaz and two-out walks by both Jordan Schafer and Martin Prado to set the stage for Johnson, who took three straight balls from reliever Mike Hinckley before getting his free pass on the fifth pitch.

Rafael Soriano pitched a scoreless ninth for his second save of the season.

Jurrjens and John Lannan dueled for seven scoreless innings in a beautiful head-to-head performance. Jurrjens outlasted Lannan by two-thirds of an inning before a two-out walk to Ryan Zimmerman in the eighth convinced manager Bobby Cox that his starter was wearing down.

The Braves hadn't had a starter work into the eighth inning since opening night, when Derek Lowe shut out the Phillies for eight innings.

With command of his fastball and keeping his pitch count low, Jurrjens wasn't afraid to let the Nationals put the ball in play, and when they got their hits, he worked around them.

The Nationals got leadoff hits off Jurrjens in each of the fourth through seventh innings and failed to score. The final example came after Josh Willingham's leadoff double in the seventh. He was sacrificed to third, but he had to stay put after Chipper Jones, playing even with the third-base bag, made a smothering stop for the second out and taking a hit from Jesus Flores.

Jurrjens got pinch-hitting Austin Kearns to pop up and got to pump his right fist yet again, for another bullet dodged.

He also gave up a leadoff double to Zimmerman in the fourth and came out unscathed. After a sacrifice bunt, Jurrjens got Elijah Dukes to line out to a leaping Yunel Escobar with the infield in for the key second out. Dukes, who had hit .444 (8-for-18) against the Braves this season, was 0-for-3 against Jurrjens.

A double play helped Jurrjens get out of a two-runner jam in the fifth.

Jurrjens had held the Pirates to one run in 6 2/3 innings on Friday night but used a career-high 120 pitches. On Wednesday he was even more effective (no runs) and with fewer pitches. Of his 96 pitches, 65 were for strikes. He struck out four and walked two. Mike Gonzalez (1-0) got him out of the second walk by striking out Adam Dunn to end the eighth inning.

Lannan, the Nationals' opening day starter, held the Braves to five hits and two walks while striking out four.

The Braves defeated Lannan at Turner Field during their three-game sweep April 10-12, but they knew his abilities. He won each of his final two starts against the Braves last year, allowing only one run in 13 innings in those two games.

The Braves stranded six runners in the first four innings against Lannan on Wednesday night, going 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position.

Part of the problem was that they had Jurrjens at the plate for two of those chances. He struck out with the bases loaded, for one of them, in the fourth inning.

NEXT FOR Braves

* Who: at Reds

* When: 7:10 p.m. Friday

* TV; radio: SportSouth; 640 AM, 96.1 FM