Arenado snaps slump after rare day off

DENVER — A day off for Rockies third baseman Nolan Arenado is simply an invitation to work hard.

His efforts when not in the lineup on Thursday led to a big performance on Friday — a first-inning triple and his 24th homer of the season, for two sixth-inning runs — in a 4-3 victory over the Braves at Coors Field.

Told he wouldn’t start Thursday night, for the second time this season, Arenado clocked in for early batting practice.

The practical goal of the session was to stay “inside the ball,” or not let the barrel of his bat travel through the strike zone ahead of his hands. That habit leads to pulled ground balls. In his case, it led to a 45-at-bat home run drought that he ended by clobbering a 2-2 sinker from reliever Joel De La Cruz over the left-center-field wall.

A secondary goal in the batting cage: release frustration.

“It was a little bit of both,” Arenado said. “But it was also, I want to figure this out. Am I going to sit back and keep playing bad? I want to figure out the reason why, so I could go home and say, ‘I worked my hardest to figure it out.'”

The first-inning triple came off Braves starter Julio …

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