SAN DIEGO — Look: There’s no way to quantify “underrated.” A baseball player I feel doesn’t get enough credit nationally might seem like he gets too much credit to you if it so happens your co-worker snagged him in fantasy this season and never stops singing his praises. The point of this post, expressed in the headline above, represents a wholly speculative claim based on only anecdotal evidence.

But this post nonetheless holds that — with possible exception of terrific Pirates outfielder and first-time All-Star Starling Marte — Rockies third baseman Nolan Arenado stands as Major League Baseball’s most underrated player. Baseball fans know Arenado for his highlight-reel defense, which has won him Gold Gloves in all three of his big-league seasons. But the particulars of Arenado’s situation seem to conspire to lead people to believe either that he is not as good as his offensive numbers imply, or to ignore him entirely.

“Nolan’s one of the best players in the game,” teammate Carlos Gonzalez said at the NL All-Star media session on Monday. “I feel like he doesn’t get enough attention because of where we play — not a lot of people watch the Rockies everyday, but this guy is special. He makes diving plays, defensively, every night. Offensively, he’s up there — the past two years he’s leading the league in RBIs and home runs. We’re talking about some serious damage that he’s doing at the plate — and defensively, of course.”

Arenado plays in Colorado, in both the most geographically isolated Major League location and the mile-high environment at Coors Field that helps baseballs fly further and Rockies players rack up homers. So if someone notes that Arenado has more homers than any other National League player since the start of 2015, someone else will counter, inevitably, that his power numbers are inflated by his home park. And that’s true.

But it only tells part of the story: Recent studies have shown that while playing home games at Coors Field benefits Rockies hitters at home, it also punishes them disproportionately when they play on the road. The extreme home-road splits often owned by Rockies hitters are not merely the fallout of inflated numbers at Coors Field, but also that of deflated numbers on the road because of the challenges inherent in changing altitudes so frequently. Hitting as a Colorado Rockies player is likely way more difficult than you think.

And that says nothing of the effect that playing in Colorado has on the body. People slowly adjust to life at high altitudes, but it takes time. And the frequency of the Rockies’ road trips means they seldom get the chance to grow accustomed to the atmosphere.

“I think people don’t really understand,” Arenado said. “Some teams come in for the first time, and they can’t believe how tight their bodies feel, how they can’t get loose, stuff like that. It’s definitely not easy. It takes a toll, definitely, on the body.

“Waking up in the morning is a lot harder than it is for other people. But it is what it is. It’s tough to play there, body-wise, but obviously it’s a good hitters’ park, so I guess it comes with both.”

“It’s hard to recover,” Gonzalez said of playing in Denver. “It’s hard to feel good every day. Guys that are dealing with injuries, it normally takes longer to heal. It’s a big challenge that we go through, and we’ve got to make adjustments when we go to sea level, as well. It’s a fight. It’s a fight every day; every week is a fight. I don’t like to complain much because we’re ballplayers, and we have to deal with whatever in front of us.”

Perhaps fittingly, Arenado grew up admiring the play of generally underappreciated but thoroughly great third baseman Adrian Beltre, now a likely future Hall of Famer. Beltre debuted in the Majors for the Dodgers in 1998, when Arenado was seven years old and living in Southern California. During Monday’s media session, Arenado appeared genuinely excited to hear from a reporter that Beltre had called him the best defensive third baseman in baseball today.

“I’ve always watched him and tried to do my game just like him,” Arenado said. “I just love watching him play. He always brings a lot of excitement, he has a lot of fun out there, and it’s always fun to watch him compete because he comes with it every day. And it’s like the older he gets, the better he’s getting. His style is a lot different than mine. But I want to be as good as him, and I want to do things that he has done in this game.”

Arenado enters the second half of 2016 as 25-year-old two-time All-Star and three-time Gold Glove Award winner who’s second in the National League in homers and total bases after leading the circuit in both stats last season. It’s a resume befitting a household name, owned by a guy most sports fans might not have heard of. Dude needs more love.