Mike Napoli homered twice against his former team, Yu Darvish struck out 11 over seven strong innings, and the Texas Rangers battered struggling Angels starter Ervin Santana for a 9-2 victory over Los Angeles on Saturday.
Napoli, Yorvit Torrealba and Adrian Beltre homered during Texas' five-run second inning, chasing Santana (4-10) after just 13 batters. Torrealba had three hits in his return from paternity leave, while Ian Kinsler homered and drove in three runs for the Rangers, who have won six of nine.
Darvish (11-6) had little trouble holding an early seven-run lead in the Japanese All-Star's first victory of July, yielding three hits and four walks.
Darvish has struck out a career-high 11 four times this season. He set a Rangers rookie record with his sixth double-digit strikeout game, fanning every Angels starter except Alberto Callaspo.
Napoli and the Rangers pushed their AL West lead over the Angels back to six games with their eighth win in their last 12 games in Anaheim.
Michael Young's RBI single was among Texas' three hits in the first inning, but Santana escaped when Torii Hunter sprinted to catch Nelson Cruz's tailing foul ball in right. Napoli and Torrealba led off the second with back-to-back homers, followed by consecutive doubles Craig Gentry and Kinsler, who slowed a 2-for-22 skid with his run-scoring hit.
The Rangers activated Torrealba before the game after he returned Friday night from his home in Florida, and the catcher finished a triple shy of hitting for the cycle in his first game in six days.
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Napoli added another homer off reliever David Carpenter in the third. He just won't stop beating up on the franchise that drafted him and then traded him to Toronto in January 2011 for Vernon Wells, the high-priced outfielder who has been a big disappointment for the Angels.
Napoli, who had three hits in Friday's series opener, has hit safely in 13 of his 14 games at Angel Stadium since the trade. He has a jaw-dropping eight homers, 12 RBIs and nine multihit games at the Big A for Texas -- just two fewer multihit games than the injured Wells, who plays here a bit more often.
Kinsler added a two-run shot in the eighth off Hisanori Takahashi.
