2012 Padres FanFest

I took a trip down to San Diego this weekend with a couple of friends for Padres FanFest. I had never been to Petco Park before, and I must admit, it's one of the nicest stadiums I have been to.  I knew I wanted to take the stadium tour and buy merchandise at the garage sale but my mission was to get autographs. So that's what I did as soon as I arrived. 


The Padres had different players and coaches paired up at different stations. You had to get tickets for those stations as you walked into the park. All the stations overlapped each other buy thirty minutes making it impossible to go to every one. So basically you had to pick and choose. 


The first station I hit was former Dodger and current Padres first base coach Dave Roberts and pitcher Luke Gregerson. Getting Dave Roberts' auto was one of my main goals that day, and I'm glad I accomplished it.  Dave was very nice. He chatted with everyone and even took pictures. He was also signing everything that was put in front of him, so I wish I had brought more to get signed, but I did manage to get a couple from him.

Next up was the Yonder Alonso/Joe Thatcher station. This one was kind of a throw-in for me before we took the stadium tour. Yonder didn't seem like he wanted to be there. He was signing very fast and hardly acknowledged the fans. Joe Thatcher was a little friendlier.

We didn't have to get to the next station for a couple of hours, so we decided to take the stadium tour. It was a quick run through the facility, but we got to see the training room, locker room and the dugout. From there we went to the garage sale. Everything was very cheap, so I picked up three Tony Hawk bobbleheads and a pin set.

This is the Padres Opening Day line-up from my birth year

From there we went to the next station, which was for former Yankee and  Hall of Fame broadcaster Jerry Coleman and catcher Nick Hundley. I think Jerry was having a senior moment because he seemed out of it. But he did give me an HOF inscription on a ball. I got Hundley on a Padres postcard. 

After this we went down to the main stage on the field where Cory Luebke, Tim Stauffer and Huston Street  were getting interviewed. When the interview session was over, the three signed for fans. I was only able to get Street.

At this point the FanFest was coming to an end, but the Padres did have a couple more stations set up, so we went to one more, Will Venable and Brad Brach.

The very last thing we did when we left was visit Tony Gwynn's statue. The day wouldn't be complete without seeing Mr. Padre. I want to give a big shout out to Teresa and Alex. I had a great time you guys.


The last thing I want to say is that the Dodgers should have been holding FanFests like this years ago. They are finally going to do one this year on a game day, which I'm happy about, but I would've preferred they did it in the offseason.