Nolan Arenado is Batman and Captain America rolled into one

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Nolan Arenado, despite how it sometimes appears, does not have super powers … but neither does Bruce Wayne. He may not have the fame of a Tony Stark, who broadly boasts his accomplishments, but he has the heart of Steve Rogers. Now that he has accepted an invitation to be Team USA’s third baseman at the World Baseball Classic, he truly is Captain America.

Arenado has similarities with two of comics most iconic heroes who often seem at different ends of the spectrum. Like his own favorite, Batman, Arenado can be quietly intimidating and can attack with a unique combination of quickness and strength. But he is also the respected leader who can demand a great deal from those with whom he goes into battle without fearing a loss of loyalty.

He recently swept MLB’s award season, walking away with his fourth consecutive Gold Glove — the only NL player to ever do so in his first four seasons — winning the Siler Slugger at third base, and finally securing the Defensive Player of the Year award … again. And yet, no nomination for MVP.

Much like comic books themselves, Arenado is both widely celebrated and somehow still wildly underrated. We’ve gotten spoiled by how awesome — in the true sense of the word — he is on a near daily basis. What was once a jaw-dropping CGI fight scene from several years ago now looks out of date.  “Oh look, Nolan is falling out of bounds and making a throw on the money from his knees … seen it!”

It certainly doesn’t help his case that the modern analyst’s distaste for RBI — a stat in which he slays his competition with ease — has grown to such a degree that it is often left completely out of the conversation as if that goes without debate.

Conveniently leaving out the full context of the player — that there are very few Gold Glovers who also hit 40 home runs — Arenado’s offensive statistics are often filtered through the “yeah, but Coors Field” lends with no real nuance. The ambiguity of the value of defense and the fact that he plays for a team who has gone so long without being relevant are certainly factors as well.

But like with his comic book counterparts, the problem is not that there are zero legitimate arguments against them, it’s that we have put ourselves into a box when it comes to thinking about him. Those that don’t spend every day around him don’t see the way he leads the troops but they do see the bandbox he plays in.

They don’t see his daily commitment and the role it plays in his success, but they do see and inordinate number of batting titles going to the Mile High City and reach the conclusion that great hitters here are products of their environment. The “Coors Creation” they call it. Which isn’t really a thing.

Again, the issue is lost in nuance.

It’s not that Coors Field doesn’t bolster offense, it very clearly does. Think of it like the steroid era. One needn’t look farther than the absurd spike in home runs during the 90s to see that steroids had a very real, very tangible impact on the game of baseball on a wide scale.

However.

There are plenty of players who tested positive for steroids during that time who never amounted to much on the national stage. For example, the only Colorado Rockie ever implicated in PEDs was fringy middle reliever Matt Herges. If you haven’t heard that name before, you aren’t alone, which is much to the point. Steroids, like a hitter’s environment, cannot make you good. They can, however, give a boost to those who are already great.

Does Arenado get a boost while at Coors? Absolutely. Is there a fair amount of evidence to suggest this is actually more of a negative because of the hangover effect? Yes, that, too.

But the notion that Arenado would be just an average offensive player if he played on another team is just nonsense and it has been proven over and over again by the likes of Matt Holliday and Dexter Fowler, just to name a few. MLB players adjust to their environment. Or as Ra’s al Ghul told Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins “be mindful of your surroundings.”

We should require so much more from those who feign to put statistic in context but are instead looking for excuses for intellectual laziness.

Perhaps the most compelling thing about Arenado is the nonchalant way he can go about his business while always being locked in. There’s a scene near the end of the second act in Captain America: The First Avenger, where Rogers is asked by the villain what makes him so special to think he can stop a war by himself. “Nothing,” he replies, “I’m just a kid from Brooklyn.”

You can almost hear Nolan Arenado dismissing the fact that he has put himself into categories with all-time greats by saying “I’m just a kid from Newport Beach.”

He can lead without saying “look at me” and he can strike terror into the hearts of his foes without saying a word. He uses his natural powers and utilizes the tools of his trade to fight for the honor of a city. With the mountains of Colorado on his chest, he acts as both shield and sword and oftentimes without much fanfare.

He is the hero that Denver deserves, and the one it so desperately needs right now.