Mike Napoli

Reporting from Detroit — Torii Hunter already had advised his agent to start preparing his appeal for a possible suspension after the Angels right fielder's tantrum Friday night at Comerica Park. "I'm going to fight it," Hunter told reporters in the clubhouse following his eighth-inning ejection, which preceded an outburst in which his batting helmet brushed against umpire Ron Kulpa 's face and Hunter flung a bag of balls onto the field. There wasn't much fight in Hunter a day later.

Texas (15-5): In 130 games since Mike Scioscia jettisoned him from the Angels, Mike Napoli has hit 37 home runs. Tampa Bay (13-7): Fernando Rodney, out as Angels closer after one week last season: 6 saves, 0 blown saves. Atlanta (13-7): It's them again at back of 'pen: - Jonny Venters and Craig Kimbrel combined: 16 IP, 1 ER, 29 K. Washington (14-6): Four starters with sub-2.00 ERA: Strasburg (1.08), Zimmermann (1.33), Gonzalez (1.52), Detwiler (1.64). St. Louis (13-7)

The Angels scored their first run Saturday on what is known among the 10- to 12-year-old set as a "Little League home run," a play on which Erick Aybar bunted for a hit and raced around the bases on a pair of Arizona errors. Their second run was pure big league, Mike Napoli's prodigious ninth-inning home run off the batter's eye above the center-field wall that gave the Angels a 2-1 interleague victory over the Diamondbacks in Chase Field.

Reporting from Tempe, Ariz. -- A bus filled mostly with nonstarters trekked to Phoenix to play on a wet field in a rain-shortened weekend game. Albert Pujols joined them. “It's his schedule, he's on his rotation,” Manager Mike Scioscia said. And Pujols was in the lineup again Monday against the Colorado Rockies on another trip, to Scottsdale. “I just like to play, to get my at-bats,” Pujols said. Neither Pujols nor Scioscia identified a specific number of at-bats the three-time National League MVP is seeking this spring.

Big Glove. It's not a spinoff of a popular HBO series, it's the new mitt Angels catcher Mike Napoli will try this spring. Napoli has better-than-average power for a catcher, but he went into a defensive slump last season, struggling so much with his throwing and receiving skills that Manager Mike Scioscia in August held a lengthy closed-door meeting with the catcher. "He was trying to get me to step up my game," Napoli said. "He was trying to make me a better catcher."

There are benefits to playing every day, as Mike Napoli , who shared catching duties with Jeff Mathis for the past three years, has discovered this season. "When you're struggling, you can let it go a little easier when you're in there every day," said Napoli, who caught 31 of 35 games from April 20 to May 28, while Mathis was hurt, and took over for injured first baseman Kendry Morales in early June. "Tomorrow is a different day, and you can get after it. You don't think, 'Oh, I went 0 for 4, am I going to be in there tomorrow?

The three words have chilled Angels fans seemingly every night for the last month, blaring into their homes, echoing through their television sets, a high-definition taunt. For Texas Rangers fans, it is a chant. For Angels fans, it is a cringe. Nap! Oh! Lee! The three words form the name of Texas Rangers catcher Mike Napoli, and all through town you can hear shoes flying through screens. Through five games of the World Series, Napoli is the MVP, and Angels fans are all OMG. For five years, he was their catcher.

Mike Napoli was not in the lineup Monday night for a second consecutive game, and it had nothing to do with a potential trade or waiver-wire transaction involving the Angels catcher-first baseman. The Boston Red Sox and Angels were unable to work out a deal before a midday Monday deadline after the Red Sox made a waiver claim on Napoli. As a result, Napoli, who leads the team with 21 home runs, will finish the season with the Angels. As for his future in Anaheim, Napoli, who is under club control through 2012, isn't so sure after a weekend of uncertainty, when he literally didn't know whether he was coming or going.

Reporting from St. Louis -- When he shuffled his batting order nine days ago, Angels Manager Mike Scioscia said his lineup had the potential to "get deep in a hurry." It also has the ability to go deep repeatedly. Mike Napoli's two-run home run in the fifth inning against St. Louis on Saturday at Busch Stadium gave the Angels at least one homer in nine consecutive games, their longest streak with a homer since matching that feat April 21-30, 2009. "Mike Napoli is starting to swing the bat like he's always capable of," center fielder Torii Hunter said.

While high wild-card drama played out in Baltimore and Tampa Bay on Wednesday night, the Angels closed a frustrating season by watching Mike Napoli rub a little more salt into their wounds. Napoli hit two home runs, including a game-winning two-run shot in the ninth inning, to lift the Texas Rangers to a 3-1 victory in the regular-season finale in Angel Stadium. Napoli, the former Angels catcher who was dealt for Vernon Wells in one of the most lopsided trades in years, sent the Rangers to Texas, where they will have home-field in the American League division series against the Tampa Bay Rays.

The Rally Monkey has become King Kong. The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, Southern California's cute little boutique baseball team, blew open the cozy walls Thursday with $331.5 million in improvements that could change the local sports landscape forever. Now starting at first base for the Angels, Albert Pujols, perhaps baseball's best player, a three-time most valuable player signed as a free agent from the St. Louis Cardinals for $254 million over 10 years. Now in the starting pitching rotation for the Angels, C.J. Wilson, one of baseball's best left-handers, signed as a free agent from the Texas Rangers for $77.5 million over five years.

Reporting from Dallas — When morning workouts begin at spring training, you won't find Scott Servais in slacks and a dress shirt with a cellphone attached to his ear, the typical attire for a baseball front-office executive. The Angels' new assistant general manager will be in full uniform, shagging balls in the outfield, getting down and dirty with the catchers and chatting up players as they go from one drill to the next. "I think it breaks down the walls with players," said Servais, a former big league catcher.

Reporting from Arlington, Texas -- Mike Napoli's game-winning double came off left-hander Marc Rzepczynski . But that wasn't the matchup St. Louis wanted. Cardinals Manager Tony La Russa said he wanted hard-throwing right-hander Jason Motte to pitch to Texas' right-hand-hitting catcher, but when he called down to the bullpen, coach Derek Lilliquist misunderstood his instructions. "They heard Rzepczynski and they didn't hear Motte," La Russa said. "And when I called back I said Motte, they heard [ Lance ]

The three words have chilled Angels fans seemingly every night for the last month, blaring into their homes, echoing through their television sets, a high-definition taunt. For Texas Rangers fans, it is a chant. For Angels fans, it is a cringe. Nap! Oh! Lee! The three words form the name of Texas Rangers catcher Mike Napoli, and all through town you can hear shoes flying through screens. Through five games of the World Series, Napoli is the MVP, and Angels fans are all OMG. For five years, he was their catcher.

Reporting from Arlington, Texas -- Mike Napoli was on vacation last winter when he became part of what people in Texas are now calling The Greatest Trade of All Time. That's all caps, by the way. Things, as you may have heard, are bigger in Texas. Unappreciated in Anaheim and unwanted in Toronto, Napoli bounced between three teams in four days before finding a home in Texas. Yet, now that convoluted journey has him a victory short of where he always wanted to go anyway: to a podium to accept a World Series trophy.

Reporting from Detroit — Nolan Ryan threw seven no-hitters and racked up a major league-high 5,714 strikeouts in his 27-year Hall-of-Fame career, but pitching is nowhere near as nerve-racking as watching his Texas Rangers in a postseason brimming with nail-biting moments. Several times this month, television cameras have caught the Rangers' CEO and president in his seat near the dugout gripping a baseball so tight it looks like he could squeeze the cover off. "It's hard being a fan," Ryan said.

It wouldn't seem like such a bad trade if Vernon Wells, the player he was dealt for, wasn't batting a paltry .218 and didn't have a bloated contract that guarantees him $81 million through 2014. Or if those catching for the Angels, his primary position in Anaheim from 2006 to 2010, weren't among the least productive in baseball, combining to bat .191 with 10 homers and 48 RBIs. Or if the Angels had an offensive force such as him they could plug regularly into the designated hitter spot, one with a high on-base percentage who hits in the clutch.

Kendry Morales' season-ending injury and Brandon Wood's season-long struggles created a pair of unexpected holes in the Angels' infield. Even more startling has been the play of the duo that filled them. First baseman Mike Napoli's three-run home run in the fourth inning Sunday against Colorado was his team-leading 13th of the season, and Kevin Frandsen has emerged as a capable third baseman who leads the Angels with a .352 batting average. That doesn't necessarily mean the Angels will stick with either player at his respective position for the rest of the season.

Reporting from Arlington, Texas -- Mike Napoli has no interest in simulating the circumstances surrounding the best at-bat of his life against Justin Verlander, the Detroit Tigers ace who will start Game 1 of the American League Championship Series against the Texas Rangers on Saturday night. That would have required the Texas slugger and former Angels catcher to spend six or seven hours Friday night in an airplane, squeeze in three hours of sleep and arrive at the Ballpark in Arlington on Saturday with his head spinning.