It’s time for our comprehensive review of this year’s FanFest.  We went both days, spent significant time participating in activities, and yes, Rue wants me to mention, once again, that she got her picture made with Buddy Carlyle, even though the rest of the BravesBlast staff can’t quite figure out the obsession.  So after many hours spent, we feel we can offer our opinion on FanFest and the craziness within.

The Good:

The interactive activities.  Seeing John Smoltz and Sid Bream pitch batting practice to little leaguers, and watching kids running sprints, hitting batting practice, playing home run derbies, and testing their throwing arm had to be the highlight of yesterday.  The lines moved relatively quickly and I think everyone could have gotten in on this action. (click on the picture to enlarge)

• The Photo Booth.  This line moved quickly as well.  Only downside here is that you had no way of knowing which player you’d end up taking a picture with.
• Running into friends.  We met McCann’s Cans and a couple fans of the site (and friends on MySpace).

The Bad:

• The autograph stations.  There weren’t enough of them and they were poorly managed.  Only Sunday did we receive a sheet mentioning who would be autographing at which stand – and even then it didn’t include times.  With only two stands, the lines were bad even with the smaller crowd yesterday.

The Ugly:

Lines on Saturday were downright nasty.  Sunday was significantly better than Sunday, but the number of people in that building on Saturday was absolutely outrageous.  There need to be more autograph stations to spread the crowd out.  When you see people standing in line by a “5 hours from this point” sign – at an event that is only open for 7 hours – it’s a little bit sad that they’ll spend most of the event waiting for an autograph – and it may be Jair Jurrjens, who may be a great guy, but he’s not Smoltz or Glavine

We enjoyed meeting a couple friends from MySpace, hitting whiffle ball batting practice, and getting pictures made with McCann’s Cans.  Rue, one of our staff, got her picture made with Buddy Carlyle and she is quite ecstatic.

Some highlights:

• Jonathan enjoyed proving his 60 mph fastball was 2 mph faster than Colin’s.
• Colin hit a whiffle ball straight back at the girl operating the machine – hit her straight in the leg.  She was shocked.
• Rue really, really, really enjoyed getting her picture made with Buddy Carlyle
• Watching John Smoltz pitch for a home run derby
• Colin asking Frank Wren a question at the “Ask the GM”
• Meeting BravesBlast fans
• Meeting McCann’s Cans

We enjoyed the “Ask the GM” session with Pete Van Wieren and Frank Wren.  Colin took the opportunity to ask him about the transparency we’ve seen with the Mark Kotsay deal – Wren confirmed he thinks we’ll see more and more transparency between front offices and the fans as bloggers and electronic media continue to impact the situation.

Highlights from Wren’s session:

• Julio Franco is still a free agent.  He wants to play through age 50, but they have discussed a minor league managerial position with him, potentially in a year or two.
• The Kotsay deal is not finalized – I guess pending physicals or something, but it’s almost there.  Looks like it’ll happen, from the cues we got.
• The goal is to get Teixeira to sign a contract extension before the end of the season – looks like we want to lock him up for a long time.
• Javy Lopez is looking good – sounds like he’s made some strides defensively and offensively to be in shape this year.  He trained pretty hard this off-season on his own and Wren is confident that he’s a possibility to be a strong backup catcher off the bench.
• He’s not looking to resign Greg Maddux for a reunion team.  Go figure.
• He seemed to be a little upset at the criticism received for the Tom Glavine deal – Glavine had 23 “quality starts” last season and looks to be a great addition this year.  He’s confident in that – I’m not questioning him.

We’ll have a full recap tomorrow including suggestions for improvement and what we thought about the event as a whole.  Thanks to everyone who came up to us today – we enjoyed meeting all of you!

Let’s take a look at some of the attractions, and I’ll post the schedule for tomorrow as well.

The Stages - There’s a trivia stage where you can try your hand at trivia, as well as a main stage where different activities are going on during different times of the day.  We just caught the Heavy Hitters – the drumline for the Braves – and they were good.  Frank Wren is doing a question and answer session as I begin this post, and they’ll have other stuff throughout the day as it progresses.

Homer dancing with the Heavy Hitters. 

Autograph Stands - The main attraction of FanFest, at least by popularity.  The lines for these suckers are all the way long-ways across the floor of the room.  Come in groups so one of you can hold the line while the others take bathroom breaks.  One autograph per fan, Braves players rotate as far as who’s at what table when.  They’re calling it “Treasure Hunt Style” – which means, as best as we can gather, nobody knows for sure what player is going to be there when.

Batting Cages / Radar Gun / Base Running - these look fun – get in the cage and bat, or test the speed of your fastball.  I would have stood in line for these if I didn’t have to make this post.  Shorter lines than the autograph tables, and you get to have a little bit of hands-on fun.

Home Run Derby - This looks like tons of fun.  Stand in line, you get selected to participate, and then you participate in a home run derby against other fans.  If you’re there at the right time, you may catch some coaching from the Braves players or coaches.

Terry Pendleton and Matt Diaz give tips to youngsters before a Home Run Derby. 

The Tomahawk Team - Yes, they’re there in full force, looking pretty and handing stuff out.  I landed a T-Shirt during the Heavy Hitters performance.

We mostly just wanted an excuse to post a picture of the Braves Beauties.

More to come tomorrow – we’ll be on location the whole day.  If you see one of us in a BravesBlast T-shirt and toting a camera around, say hi!  We’ll hook you up with an entry for the Kelly Johnson baseball.  Have fun at FanFest – hope to see you there!

It’s been confirmed now that the Braves are discussing Mark Kotsay with the Athletics. The A’s would pick up at least half of the $8 million owed next year – the final year of his contract. Kotsay was out for significant time last season with back issues, but the Braves hope he could return healthy and play at or near his 2004 level, in which he hit .314 with 15 homers. Kotsay has been appraised of the possibility of being traded to the Braves, and responded to the AJC with the following quote:

“It does excite me, I love Bobby Cox, and I like Atlanta and the Braves, as far as the team and organization, the history they have. They’ve always been competitive. It’s a great opportunity if this happens.”

Now if this trade does happen, we’ll see if he can recover from back problems to help us out for a significant portion of playing time, and hope he can contribute offensively – that’s one of the only reasons we’d go for him instead of Anderson or Shafer.

Be on the lookout for us today and tomorrow at FanFest – if you see anyone in a BravesBlast t-shirt toting a camera around, come say hi and we’ll hook you up with another entry into the Kelly Johnson autographed ball contest.