"It was fun," Acta said. "Some of the guys on the field made that comment, too, that it's fun to see a kid just grab the ball, be aggressive in the strike zone and keep the defense on their toes. It was pretty impressive. Electric stuff, actually."

St. Claire compared Zimmermann to John Lannan, another pitcher whose unflinching approach frequently wins praise from the Nationals. Except Zimmermann is right-handed and probably has better stuff.

"All these young guys that pitched for us last year, they're trying too much," St. Claire said. "With Zimmermann, you don't see that. All he's concerned about is pitching. And he executes everything."

To this point, Zimmermann hasn't allowed a base runner in 15 batters, has struck out six and has thrown 41 of his 54 pitches for strikes.

Nationals 6, METS 4

Washington scored three runs in the bottom of the first after Nick Johnson followed a Ryan Zimmerman double with a blast to right field. The Nationals didn't hold the lead after Zimmermann left, though - Balester came in and gave up two home runs on high fastballs, including a three-run homer from Ramon Castro that sailed over the 35-foot wall in straightaway center field.

But the Nationals recovered, scoring three in the bottom of the sixth and getting three no-hit innings from Jason Bergmann, Garrett Mock and Jesus Colome to finish the game.