Lots of Padres "greats" actually are far better-known for baseball exploits in other uniforms and just made a a mid- or late-career stop in Cali. Consider: Rollie Fingers, Rich Gossage, Willie McCovey, Steve Garvey, Ozzie Smith, Ken Caminiti, Gaylord Perry, Greg Vaughn, Kevin Brown, Fred McGriff, Joe Carter, Jack Clark, Gene Tenace, Roberto Alomar ... You could build a heck of an All-Star team of Players Who Briefly Were Padres!

I voted Hoffman but it was a snap decision and completely wrong. He's the second best closer of all time and has had an absolutely wonderful career but he could probably play 10 more years and still not have had as amazing a career as Tony Gwynn. Gwynn in his prime was Ichiro, and in his 30's he was Rod Carew. That's not half bad.

As Bill James said ... Gwynn is gweat.

HG, do you want me to change your vote for you? Just say the word and I will. I, uh, don't think it would make much of a difference in the final outcome.  :-)

The Padres have had a remarkable lack of long-term players in their history, considering San Diego .  The club leader in HR is Colbert, with 163. To contrast, expansion mates Montreal managed 4 guys over 200 (Toronto has 3 over 200). Only Gwynn clears 5000 Plate appearances. In terms of most value to Padres, Gwynn and Hoffman are far and away the top two here, although as noted the Padres could put together an awesome "played here at one point" team. Current Padres Gonzalez and Greene look to be the most likely to merit mentioning in the top -ten list someday

Looking at the franchise records, they remind me a lot of Toronto, post-WS. Often pretty good, sometimes bad, usually average, but unlike the Jays they  play in a division where that sort of team can make the playoffs sometimes, and contends almost every year.