"Given Ivan Rodriguez's offensive erosion, it's easy to assume the Nationals and Manager Jim Riggleman keep playing him out of deference more than anything. Rodriguez is hitting .200/.238/.325 this season, and those numbers figure to go up, but probably not by too much. Wilson Ramos is murdering baseballs, it seems, every time he plays.

But the Nationals have a sound reason for playing Rodriguez, and it has nothing to do with veteran presence or experience or savvy or any of those tired clichés. Rodriguez is perhaps the best defensive catcher ever, and he remains one of the elite defenders in the game, as he showed again Thursday night.

In the seventh, with two outs and the Nationals clinging to a 4-3 lead, Jose Reyes singled. It was obvious he would try to reach second base. "It was late in the game," Rodriguez said. "Everybody knows, when Reyes is in scoring position, any base hit is going to score him."

On the mound, Livan Hernandez held the ball and held the ball, trying to throw off Reyes's timing at first. He took off, and Rodriguez showed off his arm. He's made thousands upon thousands of throws since he debuted in 1991, but at 39, his arm still resembles a rocket launcher. Ian Desmond slapped down the tag, and Rodriguez had thrown out maybe the fastest runner in baseball.

"I'm not going to lie to you," Rodriguez said. "That was a missile."

"I always got a good arm. I take a lot of pride in my defense. My main priority in my game is defense. I want to get my pitches to have a great game, calling a good game for them, and I've been doing that for 20-something years. I take a lot of pride in that. My arm felt good today. I made a very, very good throw.""