The Colorado Rockies and their associated Rockies-like-substance minor leaguers took the field against the Arizona Diamondbacks today and came out on the winning end, 6-5, in a game that featured several lead changes and almost surely too much Dinger.

Charlie Blackmon led the game off with a double, but had to wait out the rest of the inning there, as the Rockies made two regular outs before Nolan Arenado lined out to Socrates Brito and his amazing name to end the first.

Jordan Lyles made his return to the mound in the bottom of the first. His first appearance in nine months didn't go all that well. Nick Ahmed opened the bottom half of the inning by lining a hit to the outfield and then the aforementioned, incredibly named Brito drove him in. A double play helped Lyles avoid a much worse fate, but alas, the inning had been lost. The second inning was lost just the same, as Lyles allowed a sac fly to the also delightfully named Tuffy Gosewisch.

Lyles' final line was two innings pitched, three hits and two earned runs with two strikeouts. He threw 32 pitches, 17 for strikes. Again, not terrific, but acceptable for the first game of spring training.

The Rockies got on the board in the third inning with Trevor Story's 440-foot home run to center that drove in Blackmon and Cristhian Adames. MLB's statcast recorded it at 108 mph coming off the bat. If somebody's got a vine or something please post it in the comments; it sounded pretty spectacular. The Rockies also put a run on the board in the fiffh with a Carlos Gonzalez homer. Gonna be a lot of those this season, I suspect.

Eddie Butler promptly gave the lead right back. After starting the inning with two straight outs (and repeatedly hitting 96 mph if Gameday can be believed), Butler gave up three straight hits that scored two runs. His final line was four hits, two earned runs and a strikeout in 2 innings. Not encouraging, but again -- his first game of spring training.

The teams scattered hits over the next few innings before David Dahl put the Rockies ahead in the seventh with a double, proving the Rox don't need to hit the ball over the fence to put runners across the plate. The good guys had another chance to add to their lead in the eighth, but came away with no runs after loading the bases. As baseball is wont to do, the Rockies paid for this when Sam Moll gave up the tying run in the bottom of the inning on a ground-rule double. Moll needed 25 pitches to get through his inning of work, which is something considering the Rockies needed only 25 pitches to get through the previous three frames combined.

The Rockies weren't done, however, as infamous "tough out" Rafael Ynoa came to the plate, took a walk, and was moved over to third on a single by David Dahl (who went 2-for-2 on the day). As it's spring training, nobody's really at the top of their game, and a wild pitch brought Ynoa in to score. In the bottom of the ninth, Gonzalez Germen allowed one hit but got former Rockies draft pick Peter O'Brien to strike out and the Rockies claimed their first win in months. On a Rafael Ynoa-scoring wild pitch. Baseball. If you hadn't thought it was back, yep, it's back.

A few more takeaways in bite-size form:

• Butler and Lyles struggled, but the bullpen looked pretty darn good.
• Dahl can hit the baseball.
• Story can apparently humiliate a baseball. My goodness.
• Mark Reynolds is gonna strike out a lot.

The Rockies improved to 1-1! That's right, they're a .500 ballclub! They're right back at it tomorrow, against the Oakland Athletics.

Rockies' Record: 1-1
Innings Won: 4 (including the most important one)
Gamethread Comments: 170
Gamethread Commenters: 19
Most Comments: hjrrockies, 29
Number of Times Connor Was Owned In The Game Thread: 14,464

Thanks for letting me do this, guys and gals. Getting to contribute at all to all of the hard work the lot of you do to keep Rockies fans entertained is an honor.