Cardinals star third baseman Nolan Arenado returned to Coors Field Monday to open a three-game series against the Rockies. Now in his third season with St. Louis, his emotions aren’t nearly as close to the surface as they were in 2021 after the Rockies traded him.
“It really wasn’t that long ago, but it feels like it’s been a long time. And so it’s a little weird,” said Arenado, who played for the Rockies from 2013-2020.
Arenado joined an exclusive club on Saturday against the Brewers when he hit the 300th home run of his career. He became just the eighth player in major league history to win 10 Gold Gloves and hit 300 or more home runs. The other players form an elite club: Johnny Bench, Ken Griffey Jr., Andruw Jones, Al Kaline, Willie Mays, Ivan Rodriguez and Mike Schmidt. All of them, save for Jones, are in the Hall of Fame.
In typical Arenado fashion, he tried to downplay the accomplishment.
“In my eyes, I don’t think I deserve to be in that group of players … amazing players like Jones and Griffey and those guys,” he said. “The fact that I am there, it’s a pretty humbling thing. I would like to take credit for it, but I really had a lot of help to get to this point. So, a lot of the credit goes to the hitting coaches I’ve had and the trainers, so they really deserve the most credit.”
Arenado launched 235 of his 300 homers while wearing a Rockies uniform. Entering Monday’s game, he’d hit 138 homers at Coors Field (136 for Colorado) and needed one more homer to tie former teammate Carlos Gonzalez for the third-most homers in Coors Field history. Todd Helton hit the most Coors Field home runs with 227, followed by Hall of Famer Larry Walker (154).
Arenado has played with only a handful of current Rockies, including outfielder/DH Charlie Blackmon, second baseman Ryan McMahon, right-hander German Marquez and lefty Kyle Freeland. Marquez started Monday night’s game, with Freeland slated to start Tuesday night.
Arenado’s respect for Marquez was evident.
“He has electric stuff. I just love Marquez,” Arenado said. “I think he’s so talented, and to see him maintain that here … pitching in Colorado is not easy, It’s not easy physically and it’s not easy emotionally. Marquez has stayed strong mentally and that shows how good he is.”
Freeland’s take. Freeland and his wife, Ashley, had dinner at a Cherry Creek sushi restaurant Sunday night and ran into Arenado, star first baseman Paul Goldschmidt and a number of Cardinals players.
“Nolan is absolutely one of the best teammates I’ve ever been around,” Freeland said. “Being able to watch a guy like that was incredible. His work ethic was top-notch and that was one of the first things I noticed about him when I came up. He was blessed with extreme talent, we all were. But he’s never taken it for granted and he works on his craft every day to get better. He’s coming up on 10 years (of service time) really soon and his commitment is as strong as it’s ever been.”
Injury updates. Outfielder Randal Grichuk, who missed all of spring training after undergoing bilateral sports hernia surgery a week before camp, is scheduled to play Tuesday in an extended spring game in Arizona….Closer Daniel Bard (anxiety) threw his third bullpen session on Sunday and manager Bud Black said, “It went very well.” But there is no timetable for the right-hander’s return…Right-hander Antonio Senzatela (left knee surgery) is scheduled to pitch Tuesday for two innings against hitters and then pitch in an extended-spring game later in the week.
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