SF Giants Fanfest 2010

07. Feb, 2010 4 Comments

Yesterday marked the official start of the 2010 baseball season!

I woke up at 5 am so I can get a 10-miler in before meeting Alexandra to catch the train up to the City. But all I heard was heavy rain so I went back to sleep. I woke up again at 6:30 am to find that it had cleared up. Guess I could have gotten that run in – oh well, that’s what I’ll be doing today. In a way, it worked out for the best – I can burn off the anticipated calories that will be consumed at Superbowl festivities today!

Photo from Sprinkles Cupcakes

The weather was cloudy with scattered showers, but it didn’t keep G’s fans away. It wasn’t as crowded as I remembered it being last year, but there were still a lot of people.

When we got there, everything felt chaotic. There were massive lines with bad signage so you didn’t know what the lines were for. We decided to walk the entire park to assess the situation and see what was going on. Thankfully, we also had our Twitter feed to follow so we could read what was going on at different stations.

We ended up standing in the photo line. We thought we were going to get to take pictures with Buster Posey, Alex Hinshaw and someone else who I can’t remember, but they stations rotated at the top of the hour. At first we were annoyed to miss them, but I was ecstatic to find out they were replaced by Kruk and Kuip! On the train ride up I had told Alexandra that I was most hoping to see them. When we finally got to the front of the line, we found out that they had a professional photographer to take the photos and then we had to BUY them! Wasn’t Fanfest supposed to be FREE?!? It was VERY misleading and should have been advertised at the END of the line so we could have decided if we wanted to waste an hourstanding in line for a photo that we’d have to pay for. Luckily, it was Kruk and Kuip or I would have gone…nuts (keeping it PG). Alexandr and I quickly came up with a plan – we switched cameras, and as the professional photographer took the photos, we also took ones, using each others’ camera.

As I was finishing up, I shook Kruk and Kuip’s hands and thought – I need to make this moment last as long as I can…

Me: Thank you! See you guys at Spring Training!
Kruk: When are you going?
Me: The first and 3rd weekends.
Kruk: Hey, I’m going the weekend of the 19th!
Me: See you at Don’s and Charlie’s!

I left feeling go giddy – my day was complete! Nothing else could top that! Well I was wrong…

We made our way to the Club Level to meet up with the rest of our Giants Twitter friends. It was the end of the Q&A session. For the little I heard of it, I have now decided that Jeremy Affeldt is my favorite current Giant. He is soooo funny – totally not a dud! Forget the “Life of Brian” tv show – get Affeldt his own show – STAT!

For my second favorite experience of the day, we got to go on a secret tour in the park, made available only to people who follow @SFGTweetup on Twitter. This is an account that one of my Twitter friends created last summer when she organized a tweet-up at a game (unfortunately I was out of town and couldn’t make it). The account quickly grew in followers and us originals followers got worried that there’d be too many people. I guess some people from the Giants followed our Twitter conversation and emailed Lauren to tell her that she could be sure the “OG Tweeps” got in.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from the tour. I had already been on the ballpark tour a couple of years ago and thought I saw everything there was to see. Wrong! The tour was so much fun! They took us through the business offices and then to the broadcast booths where we got to see the Control Room where they operated the scoreboard and the broadcast booths – where Kruk and Kuip call the games, as well as where Renel (ballpark announcer) sits. At one point I even told the tour guide, “This is better than Cooperstown!” – which I think it was.

After the tour we made our way down to one of the autograph lines where we again missed Buster Posey, but got autographs from Sergio Romo and Madison Baumgartner. I had them sign my 2010 baseball.

Next we headed to the Field Club area where we got to walk around the Clubhouse and then head up to the dugout. It was fun to see the views of the park from there. The event was winding down so we milled around on the field and took pictures at 3rd base and on the pitchers mound. The field looks messed up because they had a motor cross event there last week.

Finally, as we were leaving, we got to meet Tom Tolbert, one of the hosts of the local sports radio station. He’s one of my favorites so that was fun!

All in all, it was a great event, one that I look forward to every year, but there a few things that could have been organized much more efficiently to make it a better experience for the fans:

1. Have signage at the END of the long lines so people know what the heck they are standing in line for. Having at the front is fine, but post it at the end too.

2. While it was nice to see a posted schedule of the radio broadcast, it would also be more efficient to post a schedule of what players are going to be at what stations and what time the rotations are scheduled for. And make announcements in the park when rotations happen.

3. Have a map of where the exhibitors are located too.

4. At the photo line, set the expectation upfront that there will be a professional photographer there and you need to BUY the photo.

Overall, it was much better than what I expected and I loved meeting up with my Twitter friends. I am so ready for Spring Training – 28 days till Scottsdale!

PS The Giant Race

As I walked through the Club Level, I came a little table where they were advertising “The Giant Race” – Last year they just had the Plate-to-Plate 5K (which I ran) but this year, they’ve added a Half Marathon! Here’s the deets:

* Saturday, June 12th
* The course will take you along the Embarcadero, through Fisherman’s Wharf, etc. Its also the first race to go through North Beach (gulp!).
* All runners will finish by crossing home plate in AT&T Park
* If you register early you will get a ticket to the Friday night game vs the Oakland A’s
* Also, if you register this week, use the discount code of GIANTS and get $10 off the registration fee

I’ve already registered – who’s running with me?!