"Two hundred fifty-four million dollars to play baseball.

And now this.

Saturday brought blue skies and temperatures near 70, gently swaying palm trees, two huge red caps with large A's bracketing the entrance to the stadium they define, and nearly 5,000 fans screaming his name and gushing their affection.

Albert Pujols must have thought he had died and gone to heaven. Never before had a team presented a more fitting name for a player's situation.

It is Angel-red heaven now, no matter how much that makes Tom Lasorda squirm."