The Colorado Rockies are starting to play the way they were supposed to all year

Finally. That's what I, and probably a lot of other Colorado Rockies fans, thought after last night's 10-5 pummeling of the Arizona Diamondbacks. It was the club's second straight game scoring double digit runs -- the first time they've accomplished that feat all season -- and represented what I thought I signed up for at the start of the year: a relentless, high-powered lineup backed by just enough pitching to get the job done.

Coming into the season, it was easy to get excited about a lineup that featured Troy Tulowitzki, Carlos Gonzalez, Nolan Arenado, Corey Dickerson,  Justin Morneau, and Charlie Blackmon. However, despite all of that promise, the offense really hadn't panned out the way it was supposed to. Entering play last night, the Rockies offense was just 12th in the NL in fWAR and wRC+. It can be argued that some of the issue was due to park factors being too strict on Coors Field, but no matter how you slice it, being 12th out of 15 teams just isn't good enough for what was supposed to be a strength. The lack of offense has led to a frustrating 21 losses that saw the Rockies score three runs or fewer.

The story of Kyle Kendrick is one that's similar to the story of the offense. Mitch Hahn already did a great job talking about this yesterday and all of you should click on that link and read his entire article (as soon as you're done with this one, of course), but I'll cover the Kendrick situation briefly here. When the Rockies signed Kendrick, they knew that they weren't getting a great pitcher. However, what they expected was someone to give them 30 starts, throw 180-200 innings, and keep the Rockies in games with a mid-4's ERA. What they've gotten has been a guy with the second-worst ERA and the worst FIP and xFIP among qualified pitchers. As Mitch points out, he has been better lately, but the Rockies needed that to continue.

The first four and a half innings last night played out like most of the first 69 games of the season had, more or less. Kyle Kendrick had allowed three home runs -- he now "leads" the league with 21 home runs allowed -- the Rockies had just three hits, and the team trailed, 4-2. There was even a rain delay! That's when it happened. The bottom of the fifth inning went as follows: single, sacrifice bunt, double, walk, single, mound visit, home run, line out, home run, pitching change. Just like that, the Rockies led, 8-4, the offense was purring, and the team was on its way to a win. As an added bonus, the Rockies didn't just take their eight runs and sit on it. They kept piling on, adding insurance runs in the seventh and eighth innings.

When all was said and done, the Rockies had piled up 11 hits that included two home runs from Nolan "vote for me" Arenado and a home run apiece from Wilin Rosario, DJ "don't forget about me" LeMahieu, and Brandon Barnes. Go ahead and cast your 35 votes for Arenado and LeMahieu now, I'll wait.

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All set? Okay, good. Bonus points to you for doing your part. Now, back to the story.

This type of offensive outburst is the stuff we expected to be much more commonplace than it has been so far in 2015. Maybe it's just a hot streak, but it's also possible that something has finally clicked for this offense and it's about to start producing runs a lot more frequently than it has to this point. If that's the case, we could see this team rack up a lot of wins in the near future.

Kyle Kendrick also did his job tonight. He gave the team six innings (he was pulled after just 82 pitches, so he probably could've gone another), and allowed four runs. If I had been asked when he was signed what kind of start I would've taken from Kendrick at Coors Field, I would've said 6-7 innings and 3-4 runs. Just give the offense a chance and don't chew up the bullpen. In his last nine starts, he is now the owner of a 4.37 ERA while averaging just over 6⅓ innings per start. He's also on pace to throw roughly 210 innings this season. Those aren't Cy Young numbers by any stretch, but it's exactly what I wanted from Kendrick. Just like the offense, he did his job tonight.

We are now 70 games deep into the 2015 season. The Rockies have a 31-39 record and sit seven games out of a playoff spot. That's certainly nothing to write home about, but if everyone keeps doing their job, you just never know what might happen.