WASHINGTON — Maybe this is rooted in superstition, but when Daniel Murphy of the Washington Nationals talks about hitting and his success at it, he repeats this phrase often – “pitch in the zone I’m looking in and try to get my A swing off” – and doesn’t say much beyond that.

Perhaps after seven years in the big leagues, he has learned by trial and error that it does boil down to that simple motto.

In Friday’s 8-4 win over the Twins, “the zone” appeared to be the outer edge of the plate, where opposing pitchers attacked him in him in his four at-bats. And twice, Murphy got what looked like two “A swings,” notching a single and a double.

The two-hit game pushed Murphy to the top of the majors with a .411 average (23 for 56). He is third in baseball with a .484 on-base percentage and fourth in OPS (on-base-plus-slugging percentage) at 1.163. He has played 16 games as a National, notching hits in all but two of them.

“Murph has a game plan every night,” Manager Dusty Baker said. “And you can see him execute whether it’s a right-hander or a left-hander … Murph’s more than earned his keep. He’s done his thing big-time so I’m glad we have him.”

Baker gave Murphy the day off Saturday because he had played every game of the season so far.

“Murph’s a hitting machine,” starter Gio Gonzalez said. “It’s hard to get that guy out. He just has a game plan when he gets up there. A guy who’s playing the game the right way. He’s fun to be in the dugout. The guy’s pushing every one of us to get to that level of focus and everything like that.”

Murphy, who came to Washington this winter on a three-year $37.5 million deal, grew as a hitter since last season, and not simply because of his seven-homer postseason, and the improvement continues.