Landmark · April 21, 2026
A Thousand Runs, Built in Lake Forest
The third baseman crossed 1,000 career runs scored in his 14th season. The competitiveness came from his mother; the obsession from his father.
1,000 career runs scored · AZ
Lake Forest
Nolan Arenado was born in Newport Beach and raised in Lake Forest, California, where he attended El Toro High School and played shortstop alongside future big leaguers Austin Romine and Matt Chapman. The Rockies took him in the second round of the 2009 draft, 59th overall, and he signed rather than attend Arizona State University.
Fourteen seasons later, on April 21, 2026, he crossed 1,000 career runs scored. He reached it as a Diamondback, his third club after eight years in Colorado and five in St. Louis. He debuted in the majors on April 28, 2013.
What the parents drove
His mother Millie, a former softball player from Queens, fielded grounders for him at first base and pushed him to work harder when recruiters overlooked him. His father Fernando, who left Cuba for the United States at age six, carried the obsessive side — striking batting stances in elevator mirrors, bringing bats home to tinker with his swing. The competitive intensity, MLB.com reported, came largely from Millie; the mechanical fixation from Fernando.
When the Rockies visited Angel Stadium in 2015, more than 110 family members, friends, and old teammates from El Toro and Little League filled the stands. As a boy he had sat in that stadium with his glove, hoping for a foul ball. In 2020, Lake Forest named a street after him — Nolan Arenado Drive — the first such honor for a living person in the city.
The glove and the count
Ten consecutive Gold Gloves at third base, 2013 through 2022, are the honor that carries him. The defense was not always what it became. In High-A Modesto, manager Jerry Weinstein called his footwork lazy and made him take early ground balls with rapid, precise movements and readiness drills, alongside serious weight training. The work elevated his defense.
A thousand runs means you were on base often enough to come around — 2,019 hits and a .337 on-base percentage across 1,905 games. He has 1,246 RBI to set beside those runs. He is 35, in his first year with Arizona, still playing third.
Reporting: MLB.com, Wikipedia. Career and biographical data: MLB StatsAPI, via the Fever engine.