Royals Fanfest 2009

Greinke signing autographs
Jared pitching while Kyle Davies watches
David catching a fly ball and winning the big game
and below is a picture of Jared with his new best friend, Mike Aviles, who he got to play ball with

Having attended last year's Fanfest, I was eager to return and take my baseball fanatic Son, Jared along with me. This year was bigger and better than last year with a lot of new events and things to participate in.

With growth and change comes some growing pains however, the biggest being the invasion of the autograph hounds. Now I, along with Jared, am an avid baseball autograph collector...but, not so much that I will run full speed through an entertainment venue to get one. Not only did I see kids running haphazardly through the place, but there was more than one adult willing to do so as well.

The other bad thing about the autograph hounds, is that they made it virtually impossible to visit any of the autograph stages. The only autographs we obtained this weekend, were out on the floor. We got several that way, and had a near autograph encounter with Billy Butler and Shane Costa while walking through the convention center.

Jared had the rare occasion to play ball with Kila Kaaihue and Mike Aviles, and also got some pitching advice and laudatory comments from Pitchers John Bale, Neal Musser, Ron Mahay and Kyle Davies. Jared was throwing perfect strikes at about 37-45 Miles per hour, which is good for an 8 year old. (at least that's what the pitchers were telling him.)

Fanfest was an opportunity to get a lot of free things...hats, T-Shirts, little rubber MLB baseballs. Royals flags and duffel bags, and bobble heads too. (The night of the Tony Pena, Jr. Bobble head give-away last summer must have been the most sparsely attended game of the year, as they seemed to have an unlimited supply of those to give away!)

The best thing for me, was the dollar table at the Royals store. There you could find TONS of Mike Sweeney items for a buck, along with a 4 piece set of Drinking glasses that had been originally priced at 36.00 dollars for...guess what? A DOLLAR!
We also snagged some nifty baseballs and some Mike Sweeney wall posters. What a deal!
They had other player items too, but Sweeney was a big draw for us.

Nicest surprise of the day was the sight of Greinke, formerly reclusive, now inclusive Royals pitcher, who stayed after one of the Q and A sessions to sign autographs for the kids. GOOD JOB GREINKE!

Jared got to shag fly balls, bat, pitch, run and win prizes... so how can that not be a good thing? I even got up onstage in front of thousands of people to show how I can dislocate my fingers as part of "KC ROYALS GOT TALENT." Hey, I would rather have sang, but they asked specifically for double-jointed people, so I took the offer... I got a Tony Pena, Jr. Bobble head for it too!

-David