Is it possible Colorado Rockies third baseman Nolan Arenado, a four-time Gold Glove winner and already one of the best defensive players in baseball, has raised his game another notch?

The numbers seem to show that’s so, particularly in May. Arenado won Defensive Player of the Month honors after leading the majors with 11 defensive runs saved in May. He leads the majors in that stat with 13 this season. His glove is a major reason why the Rockies are a surprise contender in the NL West.

It is often said that hitters mature and hit their prime at the plate in the age 26-to-28 range. This appears to be true for Arenado with the glove. He's still making great plays, but the difference between the start of this season and other years for Arenado is that he has eliminated mistakes from his game.

Take this nifty game-ending double play on Ryan Braun that got the Rockies' roll started. Arenado made a scintillating stop and a good throw (or, as he put it, "a decent toss") on a play in which a lot of third basemen wouldn't have gotten the ball and wouldn't have been able to even get a force play.

"He hit that ball so hard that I'm not thinking. It's just reaction," Arenado said by phone Wednesday. "I did what I had to do."

Baseball Info Solutions (BIS) charts what it calls good fielding plays (GFPs) and defensive misplays & errors (DM & E). A good fielding play usually falls under the definition of a Web Gem -- a diving catch or great throw, along with plays like one where a third baseman might not make a play but will hold a hitter to a single instead of a double by keeping the ball on the infield. Arenado has no shortage of good fielding plays. He had 149 over the previous two seasons, 22 more than the next-closest player, Eric Hosmer, whose GFPs are largely based on scooping throws.

But Arenado also had no shortage of defensive misplays & errors. His 82 ranked second among third basemen, trailing only Josh Donaldson's 85. Though part of that was due to a high volume of work, some of it was because of Arenado's apparent belief that he could get an out on any play. That Arenado was a high-risk, high-reward defender was forgivable, though, because the reward outweighed the risk over the long term.

Arenado is off to a remarkable start this season. He has 24 good fielding plays, which puts him on pace for a total in the 70s again, but he has only four defensive misplays & errors. That’s one misplay & error every 118 innings. He averaged one every 33 innings the previous two seasons. The bad throw has been almost completely removed from his repertoire. He had 20 misplays & errors on throws over the previous two seasons; a third of the way through 2017, he has one.

That’s particularly impressive, given the difficulty of what Arenado is doing. BIS has a range rating, which allows you to look at how a fielder is doing on plays down the line or in a hole. The best component of his range rating is that he’s seven plays made above average on balls hit down the third-base line. In other words, he’s taking away would-be doubles with great success.

A play like this one has become routine for Arenado. His own team’s TV announcers rate it a 6 ½, even though they’d call it “a 12” for anyone else.

One other aspect to this: double plays. Arenado has fielded 14 balls in double-play situations with a man on first and less than two outs. He has turned 12 of them into double plays (including the one from the season opener).

That’s an incredibly small sample, and almost certainly unsustainable, but if anyone can maintain that sort of performance, it's Arenado.

Now in his fifth season, Arenado has become a student of defensive play. Keys for him include finding a four-seam grip rather than a two-seamer, on which his throws could tail to one side or another, and doing what is often said hitters should do -- keeping his head behind the baseball.

"Lean back and see the ball deep into the glove," Arenado said, explaining the term, which he picked up from former Rockies third baseman Vinny Castilla.

As for pregame prep, Arenado goes through different variants. He'll do the Derek Jeter jump throw from down the line and the Troy Tulowitzki whirl-and-throw so that he's ready for those types of plays.

"When the game starts, I'm not surprised by any ball," he said.

In the end, it comes down to a simple philosophy: "I always expect the ball to be hit to me."

The value of Arenado’s work stands up pretty well without getting into specifics, but consider how much the Rockies have overachieved. They're 18-8 on the road and 9-2 in one-run games. Every one of those theoretical defensive runs saved has been of practical importance.

We’ll leave the last word to a scout with nearly 40 years of experience.

“He makes all the plays because his instincts off the bat enable his quick feet and body control,” the scout said of Arenado. “He has a great backhand with an easy, strong arm. He’s solid on slow rollers and bunt plays. His arm is accurate and strong from all angles.

“He’s amazing. He’s a vacuum cleaner.”