A few weeks ago, we announced the winner of the 2017 SoBro of the Year Award. But, seeing as how life happens and we all got pretty busy with the upcoming holiday and day jobs, we never really got into the details of how former WSMV Meteorologist, or more appropriately titled, “Nashville’s Favorite Weatherman,” Paul Heggen, walked away with the award. I wasn’t surprised to see him win it all, as we discussed internally that he would be the odds-on favorite. But, how the voting broke down presented a few surprises.
We noticed that people would vote, and then ask us what the award was even for. I found that pretty funny, as it’s an indication of how blindly loyal a lot of people were to the nominees. But, that’s a good thing – don’t get me wrong. I do it often on this site, but I’m not poking fun at these people.
The top three have a strong groundswell of support. I realized that the overlap between people who supported the candidates and the people who actually read our site was about 50/50. From the people we actually heard from, voters were a mix of people that paid attention to us and people that paid attention to the candidates.
So, the nominees should feel good about that! You guys had people who were willing to travel to our website (maybe one of the darkest and simultaneously brightest corners of the internet), and vote for you to win some made-up award. That’s loyalty you can’t buy, folks.
As for what this award actually is – well, it’s simple. It just means we (SoBros Network and our readers) think you’re a decent human being and put in some great fucking work this year. You are our and our reader’s favorite person. Plain and simple.
Winner: Paul Heggen (58.3% of votes)
Once Paul retweeted the voting ballot, it was all over. He had all the momentum of a veritable social movement behind him. Once he was booted from WSMV mornings, the people came out in droves to support. Then, when the 80% of women in Nashville saw a chance to vote for him, they pounced. Eight nominees and he had more votes than the rest of the field combined.
But, this may as well have been a career achievement award for Paul. For nearly a decade, he’s been entertaining, informative, and funny. For many of us, watching his weather broadcast was the perfect way to start each day. I’ve written about this quite extensively, so I’ll save you guys all the details of the work Paul put in to win this award. But, it was well-deserved, and Nashville already misses him now that he’s moved on to Raleigh.
This wasn’t just a staff thing, though. Sure, we would sing Paul’s praises relentlessly, but as it turned out, a lot of our readers were big fans of his, too. Maybe we have the same demographic of intelligent people who have filthy senses of humor? I don’t know. But, what I do know is that the people of Nashville are aggressively active and passionate about helping the people they care about.
This whole campaign was truly the highlight of our year, and I’m happy that our readers felt like they were apart of something. If nothing else, at least Paul knows how universally liked he is in Nashville….except that one dude on Twitter that Poppa Bear slaughtered for coming at Dagny.
Runner-up: The Ultimate Predator (24.5% of votes)
The Ultimate Predator has flat out made a ton of friends among the Preds community. At one point when the poll was initially opened, it looked like he was going to run away with the award. By lunch time of the first day, he had around 70% of the votes. The guy has an incredible social following to go along with the advocating he’s done for the Preds fan base and community. They don’t call him the voice of Preds fans for nothin’ folks.
One of the most important things we learned during our coverage of the Stanley Cup Playoffs was that Nashville is hungry for any and all Preds coverage. Before that playoff run, we had virtually no Preds stuff on the site. After that run, we forged several friendships with new readers, Ultimate included, and it led to the decision to bring Herbie Brooks on board. All in all, a breakout year for this division of our website, and we still got to honor Ultimate with the 2017 Supporter’s Shield.
3rd Place: Curt Stallion (10% of votes)
This isn’t any offense to Lone Star, but with Nashville staples such as Mike Fisher, Taylor Lewan, and P.K. Subban in the mix, I did not see a competitive 10% and third place finish for the guy. But, congrats to him. I saw the guy wrestle on three different occasions in person this year, and every time, it was gutsy, physical, and raw. The guy commands the room when he walks out from behind the curtain, and as the reigning Southern Underground Pro Bonestorm Champion, we called him “Nashville’s Champion.” His match with Joey Janela at S.U.P.’s Maximum Over…dive was one of the best wrestling matches of the year. But, everyone that follows the man knows he’s had one hell of a 2017.
What this tells me about our readers is that we did connect with people at the Scenic City Invitational. That was our goal. As an emerging media company in the Music City, we want to cover anything and everything entertaining to our readers. A lot of them are like us – diehard wrestling fans. I still haven’t been able to find a reliable indy wrestling writer, but it’s an area we decided to explore back in the Summer.
Our first venture was a trip to Chattanooga for SCI. We made a lot of new friends on that trip, we got some excellent content out of it, and now that we’ve seen such a big push for Stallion here, we know that the trip was officially a success. And, we know definitively now that we’re going to keep covering indy wrestling. We’ve even decided to sponsor the Making Towns Classic in Nashville next Spring. So, thank you guys for sticking around.
And, of course, the retweets, likes, and shares that Stallion’s given us certainly hasn’t hurt site traffic either.
The Rest of the Field
4. Mike Fisher (5.3%)
5. Taylor Lewan (2.6%)
6. P.K. Subban (2%)
7. Tom Arnold (0.7%)
8. Dennis Kelly (0%)
The fact that, out of the hundreds of votes we received, not a single soul voted for Dennis Kelly is a downright outrage. I am offended and disgusted.
But, all in all, the voting breakdown is telling of where our readers paid attention and cared the most. Each following chose its champion. That’s pretty damn cool.
Anyway, keep an eye out for our 2018 ‘SoBro of the Year’ Watch List coming in the next few weeks.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD and #BeBetter. “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Alabama Crimson Tide football, the WWE, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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