Los Angeles @ Oakland preview

LA Angels at Oakland

Last Meeting ( May 16, 2010 ) Oakland 0, LA Angels 4

The loss of first baseman Kendry Morales was a devastating blow to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. But one player is doing more than his share to lessen the loss.

Catcher Mike Napoli was been one of the top offensive forces in baseball over the past three weeks and continued his splurge with a four-hit game against the Seattle Mariners on Sunday.

Napoli is batting .333 over his last 78 at-bats with seven home runs and 19 RBIs. He’ll look to keep his torrid hitting going on Monday when the Angels open a four-game series in Oakland against the Athletics.

Napoli now has nine homers and 25 RBIs through 59 games and appears to be a cinch to set new career highs in both categories (20 homers and 56 RBIs rate as his current season-high outputs).

Napoli had six hits over the final two contests of a three-game sweep against the Mariners in which the Angels racked up 27 runs and 38 hits – totals that make the loss of Morales to a broken leg seem inconsequential.

But losing Morales (11 homers, 39 RBIs) was a huge deal for the Angels. There’s no easy way to overcome the loss of a key cog who had 34 homers and 108 RBIs last season.

Thus, the Angels need some players to perform better than their career norms and that’s what Napoli is doing. And suddenly, a team that was struggling has won five straight games and 10 of its last 12 and stands just a half-game behind the first-place Texas Rangers in the AL West.

Oakland’s Ben Sheets will attempt to cool down Napoli and the Angels when he takes the mound on Monday.

Sheets (2-4) hasn’t won since May 8 but has pitched well in four of his last six starts.

He allowed four runs in six innings while losing to the Boston Red Sox in his last outing, but has allowed two runs or fewer in three of his last six outings.

Sheets, who has a 5.00 ERA, received a no-decision against the Angels earlier this season when he allowed three runs and 10 hits in six innings.

Starting for the Angels is Scott Kazmir (4-5), who has won two of his last three outings after a rough start to the season.

He allowed one run and five hits in 5 2/3 innings against the Kansas City Royals in his most-recent outing to drop his ERA to 5.86, the lowest it has been since early May.

Kazmir has traditionally pitched well against Oakland. He has an 8-3 record and 2.96 ERA in 14 career starts against the Athletics.

Oakland is just one game behind Texas entering the four-game series against the Angels. The Athletics had lost four of five games before beating the Minnesota Twins on Sunday.

Third baseman Kevin Kouzmanoff has performed well of late for Oakland with 10 hits in his last 25 at-bats to raise his average to .261. Kouzmanoff has three homers and six RBIs during the hot streak.