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Padres can't keep our attention so we look at recent changes at Petco Park

By jbox
Jake Roth-USA TODAY Sports

Jonny Dub and went to our second game of the season last night.  The game started early at 6:10 which I naturally prefer to tonight's 7:40 start.  Let's get these games started and get me home and asleep before 11pm.  Honestly if it weren't for the brown jersey's on Friday's I'd keep my distance from these late start times.

Jon and I entered the game shortly before game time and I instantly recognized a change to the retired numbers that now unfortunately sit at the main entrance. They've placed plaques on the numbers so that fan's can see who the number belongs to and why they were given the ultimate honor of having their numbers retired (and then removed from the most visible place in the ballpark in order to make room for an advertisement).

Next we headed to the main concourse just as Steve Poltz took the field to sing a beautiful solo acoustic rendition of the National Anthem.  I'd be okay with him doing it every night, if we're being honest.

We then rolled around to left field where we met Crazy Charisma who hooked us up with tickets for the night.  She hand delivered a Padres beach towel to Jonny that she's been holding onto for the last 8 months.  She's so thoughtful.  To repay her I promised her a fresh squeezed orange juice from Seafood Seaside Market.

Then we settled in with some Hodad's burgers with our buddy Pad Squad Andre in right field. PSA shooed away his kids and told them not to embarrass him in front of "the fellas".  He'd prefer to have Luigi and Ish watch them I suppose.  We didn't see his kids for the remainder of the night.  PSA has his priorities in line.

It was there that we took notice of more notable changes that had happened to Petco Park in our absence. First the Padres added palm trees to the top of the Western Metal Supply building bordering a new wordmark that we couldn't decide whether it was brown or blue.

PSA then pointed out that they had also painted all the exposed concrete in the upper deck. This bare concrete had never bothered me but some take it very seriously.

Jon noticed that something was missing from under the broadcast center.

We wondered if this was a permanent change or just temporary while work continued.  CMO Wayne Partello confirmed they were coming back as I joked to Jon that he whipped out his phone and quickly ordered some replacements to cover the painter's blunder.

PSA begged us to stay but we told him it was time to move on sometime in the 4th inning.  We went up to get a closer look at the palm trees on the Western Metal Supply.  There was a private party in progress so we could only get so close.

It looks brown from a distance and blue up close.

We went to the meetup in the standing area behind home plate but found that if anyone had shown up they had left. Fortunately we made contact with Padres Jagoff who invited us to sit with him for the rest of the game. Jonny and I like him a lot, but he hasn't made us a target of his MS Paint artistry yet.  We agreed that we're over the Mike Dee era of Padres baseball already. But who isn't?

Personally I don't want to see anybody fired but I'm ready to look ahead passed Fowler and Dee, they've brought us little in the way of success and pissed me off plenty in their efforts. This team is going nowhere so I actually was hoping for the Padres to be shutout again to expidite Dee's exit, but unfortunately the Padres scored one run assuring Dee's reign would continue.

Good times at the ball yard as usual, better than what you saw on TV at least.

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