DENVER — A fantastic start and surviving a midgame letdown was enough.

For the Padres and for Matt Waldron.

The Padres scored four runs in the first inning and one more after four innings of silence en route to a sharply played and somewhat sleepy 5-2 victory over the Rockies on Wednesday night at Coors Field.

Waldron allowed one run on four hits over six innings for his first victory of the season.

Wednesday was, in fact, the first time the Padres won in his five starts.

They helped him by scoring almost as many runs in the first inning as they had while he was in his previous four starts combined. He helped them by keeping the Rockies scoreless until the sixth inning.

With that, the Padres moved back above .500 (14-13) and moved on to Thursday with a chance to win the series.

The Padres jumped on Rockies left-hander Ty Blach right away, sending eight batters to the plate in the first inning.

Xander Bogaerts led off with a single, Fernando Tatis Jr. walked and, with one out, so did Jurickson Profar. Ha-Seong Kim drove in two runs with a flared single to shallow right field that moved Profar to third base. Jackson Merrill’s fly ball to center scored Profar and allowed Kim to advance to second. Eguy Rosario’s single scored Kim.

The four runs the Padres scored before Waldron took the mound were just one fewer than they had scored while he was in any of his first four starts. It was double what they had scored in any full game he had started this season.

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