The Padres held their annual awards dinner on Wednesday night and I was invited, along with a handful of local bloggers (gaslampball, ducksnorts, and rjsfro) to attend the festivities.  For those of you that follow on Twitter you were able to follow along with me throughout the event.

Prior to the start of the event, guests had an opportunity to take pictures with Padres’ greats such as Dave Winfeld and Randy Jones in front of a Padres backdrop.  The Hall of Champions hosted the event and the venue made a great reception area in the front section before guests were ushered into what had been transformed into an elegant dinning area.  The Hall was filled with Padres’ brass and plenty of important-looking people, with a few fans, media guys, and bloggers mixed in.

Padres’ players in attendance included Orlando Hudson, Mat Latos, Heath Bell, Chris Denorfia, Tim Stauffer, Will Venable, and Nick Hundley.  Future Padres were also in attendance — 21 players represented the Padres’ Winter Development Program.

Before entering the venue I had an opportunity to speak with a few of the young guys, starting with Rico Noel, a center fielder from Coastal Carolina that was selected in the 2010 draft.  I asked his for his thoughts on Petco’s spacious outfield, and his response, “I love it”— he loves to run, an intangible but essential requirement for a Petco centerfielder.

Simon Castro, a right-handed pitching prospect from the Dominican Republic and I had a great conversation before the program started.  His English is superb; we touched on how much he enjoys San Diego and his experience during the Futures Game last season.  I came away very impressed.

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The emcee was former (and hopefully future) Padres play-by-play announcer Matt Vasgersian, who sat down to conduct question-and-answer sessions, first with Orlando Hudson and later with Will Venable and Mat Latos.  The new Padres’ second baseman spoke about looking forward to playing in San Diego, and Venable and Latos reflected on the exciting 2010 season and anticipating meeting the World Series Champion San Francisco Giants this season, who the Padres dominated throughout most of the last season.

The program included speeches from the Padres’ front office personnel, including Padres’ CEO Jeff Moorad and Executive Vice President/General Manager Jed Hoyer.

Quotes from Moorad:

- “Only fourth time in team history a team has won 90 games.”

- “We are not satisfied, as you would expect we want more, we want to get to the post season and we know that once we get there, frankly, anything can happen.”

- “Most of the credit in my view and frankly in the view of the organization goes to Jed.”

- (Regarding Hoyer)  “His strategic moves not only helped us this past year, but in our view, they put us in position once again to have a successful 2011.”

- (Regarding Adrian Gonzalez trade) “It’s not often you can do a deal where you think that, maybe, literally everybody actually won.”

- (Regarding prospects in Winter Development Program) “Being able to bring in 19 players who, frankly, we expect every one of them will end up playing here at Petco, it’s a pretty special thing to be able to do.”

Quotes from Hoyer:

- “I was really pleased, Baseball American ranked our farm system number nine in baseball.  It’s the first time in a decade that we have been in the top 10.  We’ve got a long way to go were not close to where we need to be, number nine is a start, but we need to be closer to number one, but at the same time I think it’s a good indicator that were going in right direction and the future is really bright.”

- “I’m really excited about our club next year, you can never replace a player like Adrian Gonzalez with one guy, certainly we know that, so our goal this whole winter was to really create as much balance and as much depth as we possibly could.”

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To round out the program, the Padres recognized honorees at both the minor and major league levels.

The Padres Minor League awards were as follows:

- Denny Galehouse Scout of the Year – Mark Conner

- Jack Krol Minor League Coach of the Year – Gary Jones

- Defensive Player of the Year – Luis Martinez

- Baserunner of the Year – Jeudy Valdez

- Offensive Player of the Year – Jason Hagerty

- Pitcher of the Year – Brad Brach

The Major League Awards were presented to the following:

- Madres’ Favorite New Padre – Chris Denorfia

- Fireman’s Award – Heath Bell

- Chairman’s Award for Community Service – Nick Hundley

- Most Valuable Player – Adrian Gonzalez

- Clyde McCullough Pitcher of the Year – Heath Bell

The Madres’ Favorite Player award has been presented since 1995, with the first award given to Steve Finley.  With the future success sketchy at best, it was joked that a player may not want to win this award.  Previous winners include Bubba Trammel, Eric Owens, Gene Kingsale, Joe Randa, Kevin Kouzmanoff, and Jody Gerut, most of whom Vasgersian mentioned had been traded not long after receiving the honor.  Good luck, Chris!

The San Diego Chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America awarded the Padres Pitcher of the Year honors to Heath Bell.  Although I feel one could make an argument for Bell because of his exceptional stats, to think that he was more valuable to the 2010 team than Mat Latos is unrealistic.

The Padres MVP was Adrian Gonzalez, who was nice enough to tape a pre-recorded message of acceptance.  I have to say, it was a bit awkward.  In all fairness most companies do end of the year awards much closer to, well, the end of the year.  Giving the Salesperson of the Year Award, for example, to a guy that is deserving but now with another company would be awkward in any environment.

Overall it was a top-notch event.  I was excited and honored to be invited to represent the Friarhood community.