Nolan Arenado has been playing out of his mind this year and he’s kept things up right until the very end. The Rockies third baseman is running away with the NL RBI crown and will win his third consecutive Gold Glove award when the end-of-year awards are doled out.
But heading into the final game of the season on Sunday, Arenado needs to have another big day if he wants to claim one more award.
On Saturday, Arenado was limited to one hit in four at-bats against the Giants. He doubled with two outs in the first to add to his record year of extra-base hits for a third baseman, but was held hitless through the remainder of the game.
That’s important because Washington’s Bryce Harper had two games to try and catch Arenado, who entered Saturday with a one home run lead for the NL crown.
#Nationals 3-1 over #Mets on Bryce Harper's 42nd home run of the season; #Nats now 82-78 http://t.co/dlo2iNqurY pic.twitter.com/wN3TFHrY3G
— federalbaseball (@federalbaseball) October 3, 2015
Being the final game of the year, Colorado and San Francisco will go at the same time as Washington and the Mets on Sunday, so Arenado will have to get updates from the clubhouse as to whether or not he needs to be swinging for the fences.
Arenado dodged somewhat of a bullet, as Bruce Bochy won’t start Madison Bumgarner in the final game of the year, but he’ll be facing a nearly equal task facing Matt Cain.
Cain has limited Arenado to a .188 average and just one home run in 16 at-bats.