Tony Gwynn

On the first day of the 1981 Major League Baseball draft, Tony Gwynn was sitting by the telephone waiting for it to ring.

And it did.

"A secretary called," Gwynn said, "and didn't tell me who she was calling from, just that she needed my middle name."

"Keith," he told her.

When the phone rang a second time, five minutes later, that same secretary revealed a little more. He had been drafted by San Diego.

"I remember the first words out of my mouth were, 'Aw, (bleep),'" Gwynn said. "The Padres. That damn brown and gold.

"But I sat there with my brother and started thinking about it and I said, 'You know, they're letting a lot of young players play there.' I thought I might move up real quickly."

Thirteen months later — on July 19, 1982 — Gwynn was in San Diego making his major league debut.

So began the career of the greatest player in Padres history — and the most beloved citizen of San Diego.

Gwynn got the first two hits of his career that night against the Philadelphia Phillies. Who knew there were 3,139 more hits where those came from?

"I was like most young guys," Gwynn said. "I came up and wanted to establish myself in the big leagues. ... I think I developed because I was a workaholic as far as this game is concerned. I've tried to do everything I can to get better."

Gwynn's .338 career batting average — which ranks 22 all-time — is the highest in the majors since Ted Williams hit .344.

Gwynn's eight National League batting titles equaled the mark set by Honus Wagner. Only Ty Cobb won more.

Gwynn's 3,141 career hits ranked 17 on the all-time list when he retired.

Gwynn had the distinction of playing all of his 20 seasons in a Padres uniform. When he retired he was only the 17th player in history to have played 20 or more seasons all with the same team.

It easily could never have happened.

When Gwynn went off to college, he was not yet on a path that would lead to the major leagues and, eventually, the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Gwynn, who was born in Los Angeles and grew up in Long Beach, originally came to San Diego on a scholarship to play basketball.

Gwynn was SDSU's point guard. He would hold game (18), season (221), and career (590) assist records by the time his career was over. Those records still stand.

Gwynn didn't want to limit himself to basketball, but that's what he was asked to do his freshman year at State.

"The basketball coach [Tim Vezie] asked me to focus on basketball," Gwynn said. "What could I really do? So that first year I just sat on Raggers' Rail (just beyond the right-field fence at the baseball field) and watched them play."

Along comes Bobby Meacham on his recruiting visit to San Diego State. Meacham, a shortstop from Santa Ana's Mater Dei and one of the nation's prize recruits, was sitting in SDSU baseball coach Jim Dietz's office when Gwynn poked his head in the door, said hello, and continued on his way.

"Coach, I didn't know he was playing here," said Meacham.

"No, he's on the basketball team," Dietz said. "Does he play baseball, too?"

Basketball? Meacham knew Gwynn only as a baseball player from Long Beach Poly High.

"In high school, he was a great hitter, a guy who could fly around the bases, could steal a base, a great center fielder," said Meacham, who got to know Gwynn when they played summer league baseball in Long Beach. "I thought he was the best player I ever played against."

And someone Meacham desperately wanted to play with.

"I thought, This is crazy. He's got to play baseball, " said Meacham.

Gwynn had met Dietz briefly when Gwynn visited the campus before making his commitment. But, again, he was there on a basketball scholarship. He was a walk-on in baseball. And that was a year after their brief encounter.

"They had 80 or 90 walk-ons a year in baseball and here comes this guy out of basketball trying to play baseball," Gwynn said.

But Gwynn had someone on the inside putting in a good word for him.

"If Bobby doesn't say anything, I probably don't even play baseball," said Gwynn. "Bobby...