Busy Padres spurring ticket interest

His criticism hotter than most disenfranchised fans, David Marver has held the Padres’ various ownership groups’ feet to the fire for years.

His scathing documentary, “Padres: The Sad Truth,” has more than 30,000 views. His “Change the Padres” Facebook page has nearly 1,700 likes. A Twitter handle by the same name has nearly 1,200 followers.

Yet on Friday, the 27-year-old computer programmer was at Petco Park picking out seats as Matt Kemp, the face of the Padres’ newfound commitment to winning, moved through a variety of on-field interviews. Marver could barely took his eyes off Kemp as he decided just where to sit after years of boycotting lining the Padres’ pockets with his cash.

“I had to put my money where my mouth is,” Marver said.

The Padres have, too, a welcome change around these parts after years of penny-pinching pushed their fan base toward indifference. Today, the Padres’ faithful are pinching themselves.

As if trading for Kemp and the $107 million left on his massive contract wasn’t enough for a franchise that spent just $3 million – all in one place (Jason Marquis) – two offseasons ago. No, the Padres had their sights on Wil Myers, Derek Norris and Will Middlebrooks, too, during a wild, 48-hour trading spree last week that had San Diegan talking Padres baseball in the middle of the Chargers’ playoff push.

Then word spread rookie General Manager A.J. Preller was closing in on acquiring Justin Upton, compelling Adam Drescher of Bankers Hill to purchase his first season tickets, a 21-game package.

“I went to a few websites (Friday morning); I didn’t quite believe it happened,” the 26-year-old Drescher said. “I sent an email to the ticket rep 15 minutes after that.”

Less than an hour later, Drescher was at Petco Park picking out his seats. He wasn’t alone, either.

Fans had lined up at the box office before it opened Friday morning, pushing ticket interest to new levels in the midst of an already record-breaking month, Wayne Partello, the Padres’ chief marketing officer, said this week.

Although the Padres declined to reveal specific numbers regarding an uptick in sales this month, business on their six-game holiday packages this weekend alone trumped sales totals from the previous two weeks, Partello said.

Spurred by requests for custom-made jerseys as the Padres awaited their first official Kemp, Myers and Upton product shipments, the team stores, too, have been doing record business, Partello said. Really, interest began to grow into a fervor earlier this month as rumors of the Padres’ sudden and surprising activity spread heading into the Winter Meetings up the road.

“We have been preparing for this,” Partello said. “When (this ownership group) got here, we were preparing for the moment when we were going to make a move. We weren’t coming here to be the sleepy Padres of yesteryear.”

Those Padres’ tendencies allowed Ryan Woodaman’s family to give up his season tickets years ago. The Padres’ sudden change in direction is luring the 34-year-old Poway resident back in the fold, likely on a 21-game package.

“You talk about what the Padres are going to be able to do, but I didn’t see this coming,” said Woodaman, who plans to split his tickets with his father as a Christmas present. “I always figured we’d follow the Rays’ model: Lose 10 years in a row, draft well and then have a shot. But Preller has a plan. It’s been fun to watch. These last two weeks in the offseason have been more exciting than any two weeks over the previous four years.”

Marver’s frustration went well beyond that.

Not specifically because the Padres weren’t winning, but because he wasn’t buying the line ownership was feeding fans, he said.

Although his love of the Padres never waned, Marver was knee-deep in his pledge to not send a dime toward owners’ pockets when a season tickets rep cold-called him two years ago.

It didn’t take long for the young man on the other side of the line to realize his sales lead was a dead end. Watching Marver’s documentary as he detailed exactly why he would not purchase a plan certainly hammered home that realization.

On the receiving end of a similar call Friday, Marver’s tune had changed considerably. Today, he’s the proud owner of a 41-game plan and all sorts of newfound optimism.

“This all just seems so surreal; I’ve been at a loss for words,” Marver said. “Padres fans have never felt this way ever.”