Cardinals feed off Arenado's strong play

This story was excerpted from John Denton’s Cardinals Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

BOSTON -- The Cardinals getting as hot as they’ve been all season at the same time superstar third baseman Nolan Arenado is going through his most torrid offensive stretch, is about as much a coincidence as me putting on a few extra pounds after spending four days in Boston noshing on a few too many lobster rolls.

Simply put: When Arenado hits as he did over the weekend -- a 7-for-14 demolition, with three Green Monster-clearing home runs and seven RBIs in a three-game sweep of the Sox -- the Cardinals will often resemble one of the better teams in baseball. When he uncharacteristically struggles as he did throughout April without even much hard contact, the Cardinals will feel that brunt and often look ordinary.

As fiery and competitive as any player inside the Cardinals clubhouse, Arenado has the kind of infectious energy to affect all the others around him in the lineup. As Cards manager Oliver Marmol says, “When Nolan goes, we all go.”

That was never more apparent than this weekend when the Cardinals finished the first sweep of the Red Sox in franchise history. Arenado was at the epicenter of the about-face, hitting five balls at least 106 mph off the bat in the series-opening victory on Friday. He kept the Cards within striking distance for a come-from-behind win on Saturday with a solo home run off Chris Sale. Then, in Sunday’s finale, he singled, homered a third straight day and drove in four of the team’s nine runs.

“I just want to contribute and drive in runs when I can and just do what I’m capable of doing,” said Arenado, whose belief was buoyed by hitting at least 30 home runs and driving in 100 runs in seven straight full MLB seasons. “I know April was a tough month and I know I’m better than that. It was just a matter of time before feeling what I wanted. Thank God, I’ve got good players around me who are getting on base so that I can drive in runs.”

It was those others, Cardinals spiritual leader Lars Nootbaar said with conviction, who let Arenado down early on when he was off to the worst start of his career. When others around Arenado failed to pick up the slack, it led to Arenado pressing and feeling personally responsible for the Cardinals' worst start to a season in 50 years.

“I honestly think we did him kind of dirty early in the season when he wasn’t feeling his greatest and as an offense, we weren’t picking him up. So, that’s not fair to him,” Nootbaar said. “He is, in my eyes, the best player in the game. Well, him or [WBC-winning teammate] Shohei [Ohtani]. Similar to this team, it was just a matter of time for that [Arenado] guy to get hot. He’s one of the best hitters in the game so we’re so glad to see that happen.”

The Cardinals are big believers in the transitive powers a superstar such as Arenado possesses. Almost singlehandedly, he can slingshot the Cardinals into another orbit when he has it rolling at the plate, this past weekend being proof positive of that.

It’s as simple as this: If Arenado -- and fellow superstar slugger Paul Goldschmidt hit -- the Cardinals can overcome whatever shortcomings they have on their pitching staff and they can play with any team in the loaded National League. However, if they don’t hit, the Redbirds will almost certainly struggle -- as they did in last fall’s Wild Card sweep to the Phillies and throughout a forgettable April.

“Nolan said he likes hitting here [at Fenway Park] because he likes aiming for that big ol’ wall out there,” Cardinals’ pitcher Miles Mikolas said of Arenado’s numerous Green Monster-clearing and banging smashes throughout the weekend. “So, anything that’s going to make him happy is going to make the whole team happy.”