The first thing I did when I came in last November was study all of the reports from all of our scouts, ... Dana, by far, stood out among everyone as a premier evaluator. He has a tremendous ability to evaluate amateurs, and a tremendous ability to evaluate pitchers in general.

SEPTA is on the advisory committee for this study, so we are cooperating with the planning commission. They haven't started the planning study yet or the process of hiring a consultant, so we won't know what SEPTA's final role will be until then.

We are pleased to win the case. Mel Southard and Greg Torborg and their staff did a tremendous job during the process. It's a fair and equitable contract for both Alfonso Soriano and the club.

We are very pleased to be able to lock up Nick Johnson, who we view as one of the core players who will take the Nationals to the next level. Nick is a complete player both offensively and defensively, and we appreciate his positive influence in the clubhouse. He is the type of player and person that the Washington Nationals are all about.

Guzzy's hitting under .200 with September [arriving] on Thursday, ... Vidro's playing on sore quads and is going to have to play hurt the rest of the year. We're not scoring any runs. . . . We need some choices. I need to give Frank some choices. Between trading for him and our call-ups on Thursday, he's going to have some choices, and he's going to have some fresh legs and bodies that may spark the guys they have now, or maybe he gets in and sparks the team that way.

[Pitching coach] Randy St. Claire and I both think that we would like to start him off in Potomac, have a little success and then we'll move him. Based on the surgery that he had, we are going to bring him along slowly. If he plays well, then we'll move him as soon as his pitching says we should move him.