From the LA Times’ Mike DiGiovanna :

Republican presidential hopeful Rudolph Giuliani (above) may eventually earn Kendrick’s vote ¦ now that the Angels second baseman knows who Giuliani is.

The former New York city mayor, who was named Time Magazine’s 2001 person of the year, watched most of Friday’s game with Angels owner Arte Moreno from the first row next to the Angels’ dugout.

Kendrick was on deck before the bottom of the third when Giuliani, on his way from the first base side of the field to the third base side, stopped and shook Kendrick’s hand.

“I didn’t think twice about it,” Kendrick, 23, said. “I didn’t know I was supposed to know him.”

Told Giuliani is a candidate for the Republican nomination, Kendrick laughed and said, “I know who he is now ¦ but at the time I thought, ‘Who’s this?’ He said hello, I said hey back. That’s my bad. I don’t watch a lot of TV. No disrespect to him or anything, I just didn’t know who he was.”

Manager Mike Scioscia defended Kendrick.

“He’s a New York guy,” he said of Giuliani. “Can you tell me what the mayor of Cleveland looks like?”

Scioscia said Giuliani “was really impressed with our club, but he wouldn’t put an Angels hat on. I said, ‘Mr. Giuliani, just for 30 seconds,’ and he said, ‘No, because I know you’ve got a camera somewhere, and that picture is going right to Joe Torre.’ “

With Ervin Santana on the mound for the Angels, Kendrick has singled in today’s exhibition with Seattle, raising his Cactus League average to .526.

Facing the Nationals today, a trio of Mets pitchers (Oliver Perez, Ambiorix Burgos, Pedro Feliciano) combined to allow just one run over 6 innings…until Alay Soler blew the whole thing up real good (apologies to John Candy), with DC trailing, 6-5 after 8. Jose Valentine, Ben Johnson, David Newhan and Lastings Milledge have all hit solo HR’s for New York. While Joel Sherman tries to measure the damage Duaner Sanchez did to his career by oversleeping, it was explained on WFAN today the snoozy reliever has been allowed to return to camp. If you were betting that Ron Artest would return to the Kings before the Mets brought back Sanchez, I think I’d like you to fill out my NCAA bracket for me.